


Dani and Jamie in Lockdown

by LostGeekMonkeyGirl



Category: The Haunting of Bly Manor (TV)
Genre: Adorable Baby Fluff, Damie Baby, Dani and Jamie Being Adorable Parents, F/F, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Florist Jamie, Fluff, Lockdown AU, modern day AU, pregnant Jamie, teacher Dani
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-05
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-16 10:15:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 50,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28580349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LostGeekMonkeyGirl/pseuds/LostGeekMonkeyGirl
Summary: Snapshots of Dani and Jamie's life in lockdown with their son Mason and their daughter Blake.
Relationships: Dani Clayton & Jamie, Dani Clayton/Jamie, damie - Relationship
Comments: 56
Kudos: 229





	1. Online Learning

**Author's Note:**

> Might make this into a series of oneshots or something if people like this one, so please comment any thoughts for future chapters!

“God, I hate online learning” Jamie groaned as she stretched her arms above her head and yawned loudly. 

It was another day in lockdown which meant another day of Jamie having to help their son with his online schooling.

Dani loved doing online learning, although she preferred in-person teaching, she had vowed to make it as fun for her students as she possibly could. Dani was a teacher at the local primary school to a bunch of 30 wonderful 8-year-olds and she adored her job. When the lockdown was announced and she had to adjust to teaching her students from home, Dani was determined to make online school as fun and as engaging so, she went above and beyond every day. Her school had said that teachers didn’t need to do online live sessions, but Dani insisted that she wanted to. She couldn’t bear to just send out worksheets every day, she wanted to see her students and she wanted them to see her too and engage with her. How would they learn anything if they just completed boring worksheets every day? So, she had taken over the spare bedroom in their house and had turned it into her very own classroom from home. She had decorated it with brightly coloured posters and had even printed off some of her student’s drawings that they had sent her and put them up on the walls too. Every morning without fail, Dani would be there on Zoom with a wide toothy grin on her face and an unlimited amount of enthusiasm ready to start the day.

Jamie, however, was over online learning. Whilst Dani was busy teaching her class, Jamie was left to stumble through the weird, seemingly pointless daily exercises that Mason’s teacher sends every day. Jamie had never cared for school, her teachers had been boring, unenthusiastic and never cared for her progress so having to teach her son things she’d never actually learnt herself was quite overwhelming, even with a teacher in the house. Dani helped when she could, but she was busy all day and Jamie never really wanted to bother her. Jamie never understood why Mason couldn’t just sit in on Dani’s class, but he was only 6 and Dani taught 8-year-olds so she supposed there would be a little essential knowledge that he didn’t know in order for him to follow along, but she thought it would make more sense to him than what she was trying to teach him. 

“You’re doing a great job, baby” Dani said reassuringly as she rolled over to face Jamie and kissed her temple. “I’m only teaching this morning, the kids are doing independent reading this afternoon so I can take over if you want, give you a break?” Dani said after a second of thinking.

“Nah, it's fine, I’ve got it, you need a break too, y’know, you’ve been doing such a great job, you need a little rest” Jamie said as she yawned again and reached out her hand to rest of Dani’s thigh under the duvet. 

“No, I’ll take over this afternoon, you need a break” Dani said firmly, knowing full well Jamie was drained and overwhelmed with trying to teach Mason on her own every day and she could see Jamie was losing enthusiasm.

“Dani” Jamie said, trying to protest. She knew Dani also deserved a break. She had been working so hard trying to give her class the best education she could, given the circumstances, and she knew how tiring it must be to teach kids over Zoom. 

“It’s not up for debate, Jamie. You’re having the afternoon off” Dani said in her teacher voice that told Jamie she wasn’t up for taking any other options.

The teacher voice wasn’t something Dani often used with Jamie as she never really needed to, but she knew the effect it had on her. She saw Jamie take her bottom lip between her teeth unconsciously when Dani spoke in that tone, and she felt Jamie’s hand squeeze her thigh.

“Well, okay then Mrs Clayton, whatever ya say” Jamie said, smirking and running her tongue over her bottom lip and hand higher up Dani’s thigh.

Before Jamie could act on the ideas that were running through her mind, Dani kissed her cheek and got out of their bed to get ready for the day. Jamie groaned when her hand fell off Dani’s thigh and onto the soft sheets below.

Jamie sat at the kitchen table that morning with Mason as they did every day with the laptop sat in the middle of them detailing how Jamie should carry out her lesson. Today was history, one of Jamie’s least favourite subjects. 

“So, The Great Fire of London,” Jamie started, her eyes scanning over the document in front of her, “according to this, it happened in 1666”. 

Mason looked at her attentively as she spoke. He admired Jamie so much and always gave her his undivided attention whenever she spoke. He followed her everywhere she went and copied everything she did. It wasn’t so bad until Jamie would accidentally let out a curse word every now and then and Mason would repeat it. Once Jamie was playing football with him in the back garden and tripped over and fell to the ground yelling out “Fucking hell!”. It was the first time she had sworn around him and of course, that’s the only thing he repeated for a week straight. Jamie had cried every night as Mason wouldn’t stop saying it and Dani was always there to reassure her and tell her not to worry, he didn’t know what it meant, and he would eventually stop saying it. Dani was of course right as always, and after a week, he moved on to something else and he had never said it again. 

Jamie got out the large box of craft supplies and helped Mason create a poster all about The Great Fire of London as was asked by his teacher. 

Just as they’d finished, Dani came wondering down the stairs and into the kitchen. Mason jumped down from the chair he was sitting on and ran over to Dani to show her what he had made. 

“Oh wow, honey, that’s amazing, let me have a look!” Dani said as she knelt down and took hold of his poster to give it a closer inspection. 

Mason smiled proudly as he watched Dani intently read the poster he had made. After Dani spent some minutes reading over the poster, she picked him up and gave him a hug. “I’m so proud of you, baby, your poster is so good” Dani said as she kissed him on the top of his head and breathed in his all too familiar scent. Dani couldn’t get enough of the way Mason smelt, ever since he was born, and she had held him for the first time. Over time his baby scent slowly faded away and was replaced by flowery shampoo, but his unique Mason smell had never left, and she hoped it never would.

Dani set about making them all some lunch whilst Jamie cleared the table of the mess her and Mason had made whilst creating his history poster. 

10 minutes later Dani placed a salad in front of Jamie and a sandwich in front of Mason. All three ate their lunch together which was accompanied by an easy flowing conversion. 

After lunch was finished, Dani cleared the three empty plates from the kitchen table and Jamie took Mason into the back garden to play for a while before his afternoon classes started. 

Dani watched them play as she washed the dished in the sink. She loved watching Jamie and Mason together and always took any opportunity she could to do so. Her heart would swell at just how much of an incredible Mother Jamie was to their son. When they had decided to have a child together, Dani was the confident one. She had spent all her life caring for children and teaching them, so she had plenty of experience but Jamie on the other hand was hesitant. Although she had spent her life in foster care surrounded by children, she had no experience caring for them. She often kept herself to herself and hated anything that interrupted her boring, solitude life and a child would basically shatter that. She was also scared of just being a parent and having a small helpless baby who relied solely on her to take care for them. But having a child who she had to teach morals to and raise to be a good, well-rounded person, well, that scared her more than anything. Her parents had hardly been an inspiration to her or the numerous foster parents she’s had over the years, so she didn’t have any parental role models to base her own parenting on. However, Jamie loved the idea of having a child with Dani and being able to give them the life that she never had so, after many long conversations, they had finally decided to start their own little family. Dani had insisted Jamie would make a wonderful parent and she was right. 

Mason came running back into the kitchen 20 minutes later followed by a slightly sweaty and out of breath Jamie. Dani handed a cup full of water to Mason as he walked up to her, ready to ask for one. Dani then handed a glass to Jamie as she followed behind him and gladly gulped down the water. Dani smiled as she watched Mason and Jamie drink their water in exactly the same way, one hand on their hip with their heads tipped back as they quickly swallowed the cool liquid. Although Mason and Jamie shared no genetics, and they looked absolutely nothing alike, he behaved exactly like Jamie. He was a spitting image of Dani, soft wavey blonde hair, bright blue eyes and a wide toothy grin but he walked like Jamie, acted like Jamie and even talked like Jamie, adopting her northern accent even though they lived in the south of England. So, in that respect, Mason was the perfect combination of the both of them. 

“Right, so what is it this afternoon? Math?” Dani asked as she collected the empty glasses from the pair in front of her. Mason just nodded as he wiped the excess water from around his mouth with his sleeve just as Jamie was doing the same. 

“Okay then, let’s go, let’s do some math!” Dani said enthusiastically, knowing math wasn’t Mason’s favourite subject but wanting to get him engaged anyway. 

“But what about Mum?” Mason said looking up at Jamie with knitted eyebrows.

“Mum’s got other things she needs to do this afternoon, so I’d said I’d help you with your class this afternoon” Dani said giggling as Mason looked between Dani and Jamie with confusion written all over his face at the change of routine.

“But Mum always helps me” Mason protested, not wanted to be away from Jamie. 

“I know she does, but you’ve got me this afternoon, surely you can cope without Mum for a few hours?” Dani smiled as Mason frowned up at her.

“Hey, kiddo” Jamie said kneeling down, so she was at Mason’s height, “I’ll just be upstairs, alright? You can do maths without me, can’t ya? I'm not good at it anyways, Mommy’s so much better than me, she’ll be able to help ya more”.

“Okay” Mason said, finally giving in, knowing Jamie wasn’t going to be helping him this afternoon.

“Good boy” Jamie said chuckling and kissing his head, “Enjoy ya lesson, okay? You can tell me all about it when you’ve finished”.

Mason nodded and wrapped his arms tightly around Jamie as if she was leaving for a month and not a few hours. Mason had gotten pretty attached to Jamie since lockdown had begun as he spent the majority of his days with her whilst Dani was busy working. Jamie’s flower shop had had to close due to the pandemic, so she was at home all the time now and if she was being honest, she had grown pretty attached to Mason too, often feeling a little weird and like she was missing something when she wasn’t around him. 

“I’ve run you a bath if you want it” Dani said to Jamie as Mason went to take his usual seat at the kitchen table that acted as his make-shift classroom. 

“Mmh really? Thanks, baby” Jamie said as she placed her hands on Dani’s hips and pulled her closer so she could kiss her neck. 

Dani giggled as Jamie peppered light kisses on her neck and gripped her hips tightly.

“Okay, okay” Dani said laughing and pushing Jamie lightly away, not really wanting her to stop her kisses but knowing it would turn into something else if she didn’t put a stop to it now. 

Jamie laughed and she lessened her grip on Dani’s hips and pulled her lips away from her neck. 

“Go relax, I’ve got everything under control down here” Dani said walking Jamie to the bottom of the staircase. 

“Sure, if ya need me, I'm just-” 

“Go relax, we’ll be fine” Dani cut Jamie off and pushed her towards to steps.

“Okay, okay” Jamie said chuckling. She pulled Dani into her one last time and kissed her lovingly before making her way up the stairs. 

Jamie climbed the stairs and made her way into their bedroom. Dani had laid out a clean pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt on the bed for Jamie to change into after her bath. Jamie then wondered into the en suit to find a bathtub full of steaming hot water and bubbles. Dani had even thrown in a few rose petals into the water and lit a few candles making them room smell gorgeous.

Jamie smiled to herself as she admired Dani’s thoughtful gesture and began to remove her clothes that had gotten dirty whilst she was playing with Mason in the back garden. Jamie climbed into the bath and let the warm water wash over her skin. She sunk further into the water and rested her head on the back of the tub. Her eyes gently closed as she inhaled the smell of the candles in the room. 

After a long soak in the bath, Jamie climbed out of the tub, dried herself off and changed into the new clothes Dani had prepared for her. She then climbed into bed, wrapped herself in the duvet and started reading a book. 

Jamie hardly got any time alone, so it had felt nice to sit with herself for a while, and appreciate life but, she missed her family. She missed Dani’s comforting, loving presence, Mason’s bright smile that looked exactly like Dani’s and she even missed sitting on a hard wooden chair teaching him maths. 

Jamie peaked over the top of her book to look at the clock. It was shortly after 3:30pm and she was guessing Mason’s lesson had finished by now, so she put her book down and make her way downstairs. She knew Dani wouldn’t let Mason or herself upstairs to disturb her when she was having the afternoon off so, she made her way down herself. 

“Mum!” Mason said running up to Jamie as she walked into the kitchen. Jamie bent down as he wrapped his arms around her neck, and she picked him up and swung him around. 

“Miss me?” Jamie asked, already knowing the answer.

“Yeah” Mason said, tightening his embrace.

“How did maths go?” Jamie asked as she placed him back down on the floor and walked over to Dani who was still sat at the kitchen table. Jamie placed her hands on Dani’s shoulders and kissed the top of her head before taking a seat next to her.

“Good, we did fractions” Mason replied, climbing onto his usual seat at the table.

“Fractions, wow, there’re pretty hard right?” Jamie said, speaking from her own experience of the topic.

“Nah not really, Mommy said I got the hang of ‘em pretty quickly” Mason said with a proud smile on his face.

“Is that right?” Jamie said smiling and turning to Dani for confirmation.

“Sure is, took him no time to figure them out. Look he even got 10 out of 10 on his worksheet” Dani said, handing a piece of paper to Jamie to look at.

Jamie looked through it and furrowed her eyebrows as she studied the questions. She was very thankful that she didn’t have to teach Mason this as she had no clue what the worksheet was on about. “So proud of ya, buddy” Jamie said after reading through all the questions and Mason’s answers.

The rest of the evening went as it always did, Dani made dinner and Jamie did all she could to help even though she was a rubbish cook, Jamie gave Mason a bath and then they both put him to bed.

“So, how did ya like ya first taste of home schooling?” Jamie said as she sat on the sofa watching TV with Dani’s head resting in her lap.

“It went good I think, he seemed to understand everything so that’s the main goal, right?” Dani said giggling as she looked up at Jamie with loving eyes.

“Sure is” Jamie said as she ran her hand over Dani’s forehead and combed her fingers through her hair. “Thanks for, erm, taking over this afternoon Poppins, I actually really needed that break I think” Jamie said softly and sincerely. 

“No problem, baby” Dani said, leaning to the side to kiss Jamie’s stomach, the only part of Jamie she could reach without getting up.

Jamie leant down so she could connect their lips. “Next time ya have an afternoon off, the breaks yours”.

Dani smiled, “I don’t need-”.

“It isn’t up for debate” Jamie said, using the same phrase Dani said to her earlier in the day.

Dani laughed loudly as she realised Jamie had used her own phrase against her. “Fine” Dani said smiling, “I can take a break”.


	2. Sugar Rush

It was a sweltering hot day in the middle of a very unexpected heat wave in England. Houses in England were designed to keep warmth in, not let it out, so conditions were becoming quite unbearable. Every window was wide open, all the fans available were out and switched on and everyone was wearing the least amount of clothing appropriate.

Dani was upstairs teaching like always. Jamie felt especially sorry for her as she had to keep the windows closed and she couldn’t have a fan on since her students wouldn’t be able to hear a word she was saying so, she opted to keep the usually closed door open just the slightest bit in hopes of letting the warm air escape and the cool air in. 

Jamie was sat downstairs at the kitchen table with Mason as usual trying to teach him something she’d never even heard of. Both were losing interest pretty quickly, possibly due to the heat, but it was more likely because today’s topic of work was geography. Jamie could sense Mason was itching to leave the table in search of something more interesting to do and she didn’t blame him. Who thought it was a good idea to teach 6-year-olds about rocks? She thought for a second before shutting the laptop closed, “Right, enough of that for now, shall we go to the park?”.

Mason’s head quickly shot around to look at Jamie, his eyes were wide in surprise and shock at what she had just suggested to him. With Dani being a teacher, he had never been allowed to skip school before, but Jamie knew what she was teaching him wasn’t going into his head so he might as well be doing something more interesting with his time. He might even be able to learn something about rocks in the park, you never know, but he certainly wasn’t learning anything sat at the kitchen table.

In a few minutes both Jamie and Mason were lathered up in a thick layer of sun cream, their sun hats were on and they were holding a bottle of water each. Jamie wrote a quick note for Dani to tell her where they were going and quietly slid it threw the gap in the door so she could find it if she was wondering where they were. Jamie could hear Dani enthusiastically singing a song about the times tables and a large smile filled her face as she stood quietly for a few seconds to listen to her wife before heading back downstairs and out of the door.

Jamie and Mason spent an hour in the local park playing football together and walking around the park to look at the plants. Because Jamie loved plants, Mason did too. Before lockdown, he would help her out in her flower shop watering, repotting and he had even started helping her with the flower arrangements she made for customers. He had quickly picked up the dos and don’ts of caring for plants and was becoming pretty good at it. He had asked Jamie if they could grow some vegetables at the start of lockdown and Jamie had agreed. Vegetable growing wasn’t exactly her forte, but she reckoned it would be pretty similar to flower growing. Jamie had basically left Mason to it, she would read him the seed packets and do the jobs he struggled to do like filling the planters with soil but everything else was down to Mason. Daily water and feeding were his responsibility, and he was doing a great job. The vegetable plants were thriving and soon enough, they would have a whole range of vegetables to eat. It was an understatement to call Jamie proud, her heart practically felt like it was going to explode every time she saw Mason with plants. And the fact that he seemed to be a natural, made her heart swell even more. 

“Ice crème!” Mason shouted as he pointed to the ice crème van in the corner of the park and began walking quickly towards it.

“Hey, slow down, kiddo” Jamie said laughing as she followed quickly behind him. 

“Can we get one? I promise I won't tell Mommy” Mason said, putting on his best puppy dog eyes that looked exactly like Dani’s. Jamie knew exactly who he’d learnt that move from.

Jamie rolled her eyes and laughed as Mason promised not to tell Dani. Dani restricted his sugar intake and for good reason too, the tiniest drop of refined sugar and he would be running around like a headless chicken. However, Jamie was a little more lenient, Mason was her weak spot, and he knew it and often took advantage of it too. But one ice crème would be harmless right? If he had a sugar rush they were in the park and he would quickly come down from it after a few minutes of running around and Dani would be non the wiser.

Mason watched Jamie intently as she paused and pretended to consider his request, but she already knew the answer she was going to give him, “Fine, you can have one but only because you’ve done amazingly well doing your schoolwork every day alright? But we have to share, a full ice crème to yaself might tip ya over the edge a little too much and we don’t want that happening”.

Mason grinned widely up at Jamie then wrapped his arms around her legs tightly. She knew exactly what he was doing, he did it every time. He knew his sweet smile and adorable face made Jamie melt and give in to what he wanted; it worked like a charm every single time.

Jamie ordered a tub of chocolate ice crème with two spoons and then they sat down in the grass and ate it together. 

They stayed a while longer in the park and played football again together before heading home. The sugar rush was usually pretty instant so when Mason was acting normally, Jamie just assumed he had enough sugar to make it happen or he had burned the sugar off whilst playing so, she took him home.

When they arrived home, Mason shot off upstairs before Jamie could stop him. Neither of them ever went upstairs during the day as not to disturb Dani and if they needed anything, Jamie would creep up as silently as she could like she was in some kind of heist film. 

“Mas-” she sternly whispered but it was no use, his loud, heavy footsteps were already at the top of the stairs and heading in the direction of Dani. It looked like his sugar rush had finally hit. 

Jamie rolled her eyes and let out a sigh, knowing Dani would be annoyed at her for letting Mason have ice cream and for letting him disturb her so she quickly climbed the stairs in hopes of stopping him before he caused any damage.

Just as Jamie reached the top of the stairs, she saw Mason start to push Dani’s door open. Jamie sternly whispered his name again, but it was no use, he was already making his way into the room.

When Jamie reached Dani’s room, she heard Dani teaching her class and Jamie cursed under her breath before kneeling down and crawling into the room after Mason as not to appear in Dani’s camera. 

“Mason!” Jamie angrily whispered as he turned to face her. He looked her dead in the eyes then smiled before running around Dani’s room. He knew exactly what he was doing, and Jamie swore that would be the last time he ever had ice crème in his whole life. 

Dani seemed to be oblivious to the goings on in the room as she had her back to the pair and was so focused on teaching her class. 

Jamie quickly crawled over to where Mason was and grabbed him by the waist and brought him to the floor. As she did so, Mason let out a loud laugh and a scream which caused Dani to turn quickly to the source of the noise. 

Jamie was knelt on the floor, holding Mason by his foot to keep him from crawling away, looking like a deer caught in headlights when she heard Mason scream. 

Dani’s eyes scanned over the pair that were laid on her floor with an initial look of confusion, but then she smiled widely at them and giggled as she saw Jamie frozen in time hoping her stillness would stop Dani from hearing Mason’s screams. 

Jamie scrunched her face up as she moved backwards slowly, trying not to make any noise as she pulled Mason by the leg. Jamie gave Dani an apologetic look and mouthed “Sorry” as she carried on pulling Mason out of the room.

Just as they were near the door, Mason shouted “I don’t want to leave! I wanna play with Mommy and eat more ice crème!”. 

Jamie quickly dragged Mason towards her as she heard Dani’s class laugh loudly over the laptop speakers. Jamie quickly picked Mason up and stood up to make a swift exit from the room but as she did so, she heard the laughs grow louder. She sighed loudly as she knew Dani’s class had seen her.

Dani was also laughing now as she watched the event unfold on her laptop screen. 

Behind her Jamie was stood frozen in the doorway holding Mason who was dangling upside down and giggling loudly. 

“Who’s that, Mrs Clayton?” Jamie heard through Dani’s laptop speakers.

“Well, this is,” Dani said as she beckoned Jamie to walk closer to her, signalling that it was okay to do so and that she wasn’t in trouble. Jamie quickly shook her head, so Dani walked over to her and picked Mason up and turned him the right way around. She took Jamie’s hand and led her towards the laptop.

“This is my wife, Jamie” Dani said smiling widely and bringing Jamie closer to the camera to show her to the class.

Jamie awkwardly waved and smiled and watched as the children smiled and waved back at her and some even said hello.

Dani had never hidden her private life from her students. Naturally, young children are inquisitive, and they would often ask her about if she was married and if she had children and Dani would tell them the truth. When they had asked to see pictures of Jamie and their wedding day or pictures of Mason, she had happily showed them. Some teachers at the school didn’t exactly think it was appropriate for Dani to be telling her students that she had a wife, but Dani didn’t care. Her students were interested, and she wanted to normalise all different types of relationships, so she told them. No child had ever said anything unkind to her and no parents had ever made a complaint so, it didn’t matter to her what any of the other teachers thought. 

“And this is our son, Mason” Dani said, sitting him on her lap as she sat down in her chair. 

Mason waved to Dani’s students and they all waved back at him.

One of the children then asked, “What flavour ice crème did eat, Mason?”.

Dani laughed and looked at Mason for a response. “Chocolate!” he responded smiling widely then suddenly looked around at Jamie who was stood behind them. His eyes were wide as he realised what he had just admitted to. 

Jamie just smiled at him softly, letting him know it was fine that he had just inadvertently told Dani he had had ice crème when he had promised that he wouldn’t.

After a few more questions from the students, Jamie and Mason left the room to let Dani carry on teaching in peace. 

“Sorry for this afternoon” Jamie said apologetically as her and Dani were laid in bed that night. 

“It’s fine don’t worry about it, baby, I'm surprised it hasn’t happened before now” Dani said chuckling and running her fingers absentmindedly through Jamie’s hair as her head was laid on her chest.

“I really did try my best to stop him” Jamie said, still trying to apologise to Dani even though she didn’t need to.

“I saw” Dani said giggling as she remembered Jamie slowly dragging Mason out of the room by his leg, “But it's fine, no harm was done. We actually needed the break I think, everyone was getting a little tired and fed up, so we were glad for the entertainment. Anyway, they keep asking when they can see you and now, they finally have”.

“Really, why?” Jamie said, sitting up a little to look at Dani.

“Yeah, they keep asking if you will come and say hi to them during class. I suppose it's because I’ve shown them so many pictures of you guys that they probably just want to see whether you actually exist in real life or if I’ve just made you up” Dani said chuckling a little. “You should come and give them a talk one day, about plants maybe, or the flower shop, they would love that”.

“I don’t think they’ll wanna learn about plants, they’re 8” Jamie said, not really liking the sound of the idea and she knew once Dani had an idea, there was no stopping her.

“They would, I know they would. I mean it would also help that it’s you giving the talk, they love you and you could probably talk to them about anything and they’d sit and listen. They are a really attentive class, you know” Dani protested, knowing it would be something her students would like, and it would also be something different for them to do.

“They don’t even know me” Jamie said chuckling.

“I think I’ve told them enough about you for them to have some understanding of you. I think it would be fun, I mean I would be there helping you obviously, I wouldn’t just leave you on your own and look at how much Mason loves plants, that’s all down to you teaching him about them. Just think about it and if you don’t want to do it, that’s fine, just let me know” Dani said lovingly, trying to persuade Jamie the best she could but knowing teaching wasn’t Jamie’s cup of tea.

Jamie smiled as she listened to Dani trying to convince her, “I’ll think about it, but no promises, okay?”. 

“Okay” Dani said excitedly then kissing the top of Jamie’s head, knowing that Jamie would come around to the idea eventually. 

“Right, now go to sleep, got another mind-numbing day of teaching to do tomorrow, Mrs Clayton, gotta get some rest” Jamie said as she snuggled closer into Dani’s chest and kissed the skin beneath her lips.

Dani kissed the top of Jamie’s head again and wrapped her arms tightly around her wife, squeezing her softly. “Good night, baby” Dani whispered, but Jamie was already fast asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Credit it Winter_Daze for the idea!
> 
> Please comment any more ideas you may have for future chapters! :)


	3. Sick Day

The heatwave was finally over but when Jamie woke up at 6am covered in sweat, she couldn’t tell if it was the weather causing her to feel boiling hot or something else. As she laid on her back in bed, she pushed the duvet to one side to try and cool herself down. She quickly placed her hand on her stomach as a sharp pain ran through her abdomen.

“Are you okay?” Dani whispered as she shifted a little to look at her wife next to her who was uncharacteristically laying on her back and not on Dani’s chest. 

“Oh, hey” Jamie said, a little startled by Dani’s voice as she thought she was still asleep, “Yeah, no I'm all good, just woke up, feel a little groggy is all”. Jamie waved her hand in a dismissive way in hopes Dani would believe her. In truth, Jamie felt awful, but she didn’t want Dani to know that. Dani had been so busy recently trying to plan how she was going to carry out her class assessments, so Jamie really didn’t want to put any unnecessary stress onto Dani when she had enough to worry about. Jamie was sure she would feel better once she got up and started the day. 

“Okay, you sure?” Dani asked, still not fully believing Jamie.

“Yeah, I’m fine” Jamie said again, trying to make her tone more believable than it was before as clearly Dani didn’t buy her lie.

Dani rested her arm on Jamie’s stomach and kissed her temple and as she did, she felt the thick layer of sweat on Jamie’s skin. “Jamie, why are you so wet?” Dani asked pulling back to look at Jamie, concern evident in her voice. Dani sat up and scanned her eyes over her wife’s body trying to find what might be wrong with her.

“Always am around ya, Dani” Jamie joked. She knew that if she made a joke, Dani wouldn’t be as concerned, but her attempt at easing Dani’s mind didn’t work the way she had hoped it would.

Dani ignored the joke and placed her hand on Jamie’s forehead, “Jamie, you’re so hot, are you sure you feel alright?”.

“I’m always hot, ya tell me all the time” Jamie smirked, but Dani still didn’t laugh at her joke, instead she just looked at her with a stern look on her face. “Dani, I’m fine, just got a little hot in the night, honestly I'm fine, no need to look at me like that” Jamie said, her voice sounding a lot more convincing now.

“Okay, if you say so, just, maybe take it easy today then, just to be sure” Dani said before kissing Jamie on the forehead and leaving to go for a shower knowing that she really needed to start work soon. 

Jamie let out a long, shaky breath when Dani was out of ear shot. She felt awful and she was worried that if she sat up, she would throw up all over the carpet. 

Jamie laid in bed as Dani had a shower and her mind raced with what could be wrong with her. The obvious went through her mind as they were in lockdown for a reason, but she never went out, none of them ever went out. All their groceries were delivered which they sanitized before putting away and they hadn’t seen anyone since before lockdown so surely it couldn’t be that. They only went to the park and even then they made sure to stay away well away from people. 

Jamie’s thoughts then went to what she had eaten the day before. “Shit” Jamie said to herself as her mind landed on what the cause probably was. Mason had asked if Dani could make mac and cheese for dinner last night, but Jamie hated mac and cheese, it reminded her of school dinners so could never bring herself to eat it. While Dani and Mason had mac and cheese, Jamie had heated up left over chicken curry from the night before. Even when she was eating it, she knew it wasn’t fully hot all the way through, but she ate it anyway because she couldn’t be bothered to get up and heat it anymore.

“Fuck sake, Jamie” Jamie said to herself before slowly rising from the bed to sit on the side in hopes of acclimatizing herself before walking to her wardrobe.

After Dani showered, she quickly got dressed and went to wake Mason up. Jamie then slowly had a shower, carefully trying not to make too many sudden movements as she didn’t trust her stomach not to bring up last night’s curry. 

The morning continued as it normally did, they all ate breakfast together then Dani went back upstairs to prepare for her morning lesson. As the morning was like any other, Dani had totally forgot about Jamie waking up in a hot sweat as she was a busy worrying about her class’s assessments.

Dani’s school had insisted that she still assess her students and the logistics behind that were giving her a headache. She felt it was totally unfair to grade her students when they hadn’t been in school for so long and she had been stressing all week about how she was going to do in a way that was fair. Jamie and Mason had hardly seen her all week since she had been locked away in her makeshift classroom planning and preparing as much as she could. 

Jamie was now sat with Mason at the kitchen table as he practiced his times tables. Although she had felt a little better this morning and ate a slice of toast, her stomach was still griping and paining, and she was starting to feel a wave of heat coming over her. She stood up slowly from the table and went to get a glass of water. She took a sip hoping it would make her feel a little better but suddenly she dropped the glass into the kitchen skin and ran towards the bathroom, knowing what was about to happen.

Mason quickly turned around at the sound of the glass smashing in the sink. His gaze fell on Jamie whose face had been suddenly drained of all its colour and who’s eyes were wide in panic. As she ran off in search of the bathroom, Mason quickly followed her in concern. 

He found Jamie on her knees in front of the toilet throwing up. He delicately placed his hand on her back, unsure of what else to do but that’s what Jamie always did to him when he was ill. His eyes started to tear up as he didn’t know how he could help his Mum who was violently throwing up with tears streaming down her own face. “I’m getting Mummy” Mason said, turning to walk away to find Dani who he knew would be able to help.

Jamie grabbed his arm to keep him in place and shook her head, unable to do anything else as she was still throwing up. Jamie didn’t want Mason calling Dani as she knew how busy she would be doing the assessments today which she had planned for weeks now and she didn’t want to disturb her.

Mason started to cry a little as he didn’t know what to do. He hated seeing Jamie in pain, and he wanted to call Dani, but Jamie had said no, so he was conflicted. 

Jamie could hear his small whimpers and got hold of his hand and squeezed it lightly. “I’m okay” she whispered just before she threw up again.

“No, you’re not, you need Mummy” Mason said through his cries.

Mason thought for a moment before letting go of Jamie’s hand and running upstairs to find Dani.

He pushed her door open and ran up to her and wrapped his arms around her and cried into her. 

“Mason, sweetheart, what’s wrong?” Dani asked as she stopped talking to her class and wrapped her arms around him. Her class went silent as they heard Mason crying.

“It’s Mum, you need to come, please, she’s not well, I don’t know what to do” Mason cried as he let go of Dani and started to pull her by the arm to lead her downstairs.

Dani’s heart started racing as she remembered finding Jamie this morning dripping in sweat. Dani knew Jamie wasn’t well, but she had just believed her when she told her that she was fine. She felt a stab of guilt run through her as she blamed herself for leaving Jamie when she was clearly unwell and needed her.

“Erm, guys, I’ll be right back, just, erm, sit tight” Dani said in a flustered tone before turning off her camera and putting herself on mute then running down the stairs with Mason to find Jamie.

When they made it to the bathroom, they found Jamie sat on the floor with her back against the wall. She was extremely pale, and her forehead was covered in a thick layer of sweat again. 

“Baby” Dani sat, dropping to her knees in front of her wife and reaching for her face. She wiped the strands of hair that were stuck to Jamie’s forehead out of the way and then she placed the back of her hand on Jamie’s forehead to check her temperature. “Jamie, baby, what happened? You’re burning up”.

“She keeps throwing up” Mason said as he stood in the doorway, tears still falling from his eyes, but he was feeling a little relieved knowing that Dani was there to help.

Jamie just nodded, too drained to speak. She finally whispered “Think I got food poisonin”. Just after she said it, she quickly shot over to the toilet again to vomit.

Dani held her hair back and rubbed her back softly as Jamie continued to vomit. “It’s okay, baby, I’m here” Dani whispered, trying to soothe her wife the best she could. She knew Jamie hated being sick so wanted her to feel as calm and safe as possible.

When Jamie sat back against the wall again, Dani scanned her concerned eyes over the pale brunette to see what was wrong and if there was anything she could do to fix it. 

“Your class” Jamie whispered as she tried to steady her shaky breathing.

“Shit” Dani said, suddenly remembering that she had left her whole class unattended for at least 5 minutes now, if not longer. “Just, erm, wait here, I’ll be back in a sec” Dani said as she got up from the floor and ran upstairs.

Dani sat back down in her chair and turned her camera back on. All her students were still there, and they all had concerned looks on their faces. 

“Is Jamie okay, Mrs Clayton?” one child asked.

“She’s just not feeling very well, I'm just going to try and find a teacher to cover your lesson is that okay?” Dani said, already holding her phone in her hand.

Her students nodded and remained silent as Dani spoke on the phone.

“Hey, Rebecca, are you free right now?” Dani said, hoping the teacher on the other end would say yes.

“Hey, Dani, yeah, I just, I'm just grading papers, nothing exciting, why?”

“Do you mind covering my class this morning, a family emergency’s just come up”

“Of course, that’s fine, hope everything’s okay” Rebecca replied, her voice full of worry.

“Oh, thank you so much, you’re a life saver. Yeah, Jamie’s just suddenly come down it something” Dani said, her fast heart rate slowing as she knew someone would be able to take over her class so she could focus on Jamie.

“Oh, I hope she’s okay” 

“Yeah, me too. I’ll send you the link now, they are just completing an assessment and when they’re done, just tell them to do independent reading or something this afternoon”.

“Okay, that’s fine”

“Thank you so much, Rebecca, I owe you one”.

Dani ran downstairs once Rebecca joined the Zoom call. She found Jamie sat back against the tiled wall of the bathroom breathing heavily. 

“Are you okay, baby?” Dani said as she knelt down at the side of Jamie and placed one hand on her thigh and one hand on her cheek. 

Jamie just nodded slowly. 

“Do you think you’ve finished being sick now, or not?” Dani asked, hoping she could move Jamie somewhere more comfortable.

“Yeah, I think so” Jamie whispered, her voice deep and croaky.

“Okay, baby, think you can stand up for me?” Dani asked, standing up herself and holding onto Jamie’s arms. 

Jamie just nodded and let Dani help her up. Once she was stood up, she began to sway, and Dani clung to her and held her still. 

They then walked slowly into the hallway.

“Think you can go upstairs?” Dani asked softly, wanting to put Jamie to bed but not knowing if Jamie could safely make it up to their room.

Jamie just nodded in response. 

Dani helped Jamie up the stairs, holding her tightly so she wouldn’t fall. When they finally made it into their bedroom, Dani slowly lowered Jamie onto their bed.

“Lay back for me, baby” Dani said as she gently helped Jamie lie down and moved the pillow so it was under her head. 

Jamie was still pale, and her eyes were now blood shot with vomiting so much, but her temperature had done down a little.

Dani left the room and quickly returned with a glass of water. “Do you want a drink, sweetheart?”.

Jamie shook her head then turned over and laid on her side and clutched her stomach.

“Oh, baby” Dani said and laid behind Jamie and wrapped her arms around her. As she did so, she felt Jamie’s body shaking lightly, suggesting Jamie was crying.

“It’s okay, baby, you’re going to be okay, sweetheart, I'm here” Dani whispered into Jamie’s ear and she held onto her tighter and rocked them gently. 

Dani didn’t really know if Jamie was going to be okay or not, but she hoped so. It was at that moment, when she finally had a chance to relax a little and take in the situation that an awful thought crossed her mind. Did Jamie actually have food poisoning or was it something a lot worse? What had Jamie even eaten that could have given her food poisoning? She ran through Jamie’s symptoms in her mind and compared them to the ones that were detailed on the news. They didn’t really match, expect that Jamie had a fever but that was also a symptom of food poisoning wasn’t it? Dani didn’t really know as she had never had it before. 

As Dani’s mind raced with terrible thoughts, her heart began to pick up pace. Just as she was running through every possible scenario she could think of, Mason appeared in the doorway. 

“Hey, sweetheart” Dani said softly and smiled widely at him.

“Is Mum okay?” he asked quietly, scared of the answer he might hear.

“Yeah, she is, she just got tummy ache” Dani said, reassuring her son as well as herself.

Mason nodded but remained frozen in the doorway looking at him Mum who was curled up in a ball. Jamie’s cries had slowed to just small whimpers now when the pain was strong enough to cause her to make noise. 

“Come here, sweetheart” Dani said, gesturing for Mason to join her which he did. 

He came and laid in between Dani and Jamie like he would do some nights after having a bad dream. Dani’s arm wrapped around Mason and rested on Jamie’s waist to let her know she was still there.

Jamie felt Mason behind her, and she sensed his worry, so she reached for his hand and held it. The small gesture eased Mason’s concern and he let out a small sigh.

All three of them laid together for half an hour, with Dani and Mason trying their best to soothe Jamie. Eventually, Jamie fell asleep after her stomach pain had eased with the painkillers she had managed to keep down. 

Mason eventually got bored of just laying down once Jamie had gone to sleep so he went to his room to play. He had suggested carrying on with his schoolwork for the day, but Dani had said it didn’t matter, he could skip it today, he had a good enough reason.

Dani refused to leave Jamie’s side though in case she needed her. She watched carefully as Jamie’s chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm. Every now and then she would delicately place her hand on Jamie’s forehead to test her temperature and every time she did it was normal. 

The nagging in Dani’s mind hadn’t stopped though, she was still worried that Jamie had something far more sinister than just food poisoning. She read over the symptoms list on the government website, but it only confirmed to her that Jamie most likely did have some sort of food poisoning, but the concern was still in the back of Dani’s mind.

Dani hardly took her eyes off Jamie for the rest of the morning and when Jamie opened her eyes, Dani’s were staring right back at her. 

“Have ya been like that this whole time?” Jamie said, a small smirk tugging at her lips at the thought of Dani watching her like a hawk all morning.

“No” Dani said in a high-pitched tone that convinced no one, “How are you feeling anyway, still feel sick?” Dani said as she ran her hand delicately over Jamie’s cheek. 

Jamie shook her head, “Don’t think so, probably don’t have anything left to throw up anyway. Just feel drained” Jamie replied in a hoarse voice.

“What did you even eat that would cause food poisoning?” Dani asked, still trying to convince herself Jamie was going to be fine.

“That curry, I didn’t heat it properly. Knew it wasn’t fully cooked when I was eating it” Jamie said, a small chuckle coming out of her mouth as she recalled eating patches of lukewarm chicken.

“Jamie!” Dani said, a look of horror appearing on her face at what her wife had just said.

“I know, it's me own fault” Jamie said as she let out another light chuckle.

“You’re never cooking again, Jamie, I mean it, never again”.

Jamie just laughed, her stomach tensing a little as she did which caused her a little bit of pain. 

“God, I was so worried you had something else and it turned out you just didn’t warm your dinner up properly, God I hate you so much, come here” Dani said laughing and playfully pushing Jamie’s shoulder before wrapping her arms around her tightly and letting out a sigh of relief.

“Sorry” Jamie said, laughing then placing her hands on either side of Dani’s face, “Sorry for making ya worry, I really didn’t mean too”. Jamie pulled Dani’s face closer to her so she could kiss her.

Dani averted her lips away from Jamie’s just as they were about to meet and kissed her on the cheek. “If you want a real kiss, you need to brush your teeth” Dani said giggling.

“Oh shit, sorry, forgot about that” Jamie said laughing softly, forgetting she had been vomiting for a good 30 minutes earlier that day. 

“Here, let me help you” Dani said as she helped Jamie up from the bed and into the bathroom.

Dani stood behind Jamie with her arms wrapped around her as she brushed her teeth, making sure to keep Jamie upright. 

“Can I kiss ya now?” Jamie asked as she put her toothbrush back in its holder.

“Yeah” Dani said softly and connected their lips in a loving kiss.

“Sorry for worrying ya, really didn’t mean to” Jamie said as she pulled away but connected their foreheads. 

“It’s okay baby, worrying’s in my nature. I'm just glad it was food poisoning” Dani whispered back as she pulled Jamie in closer to her and held her. 

Dani’s concern eased away as she now had good reason to believe that Jamie did in fact have food poisoning and nothing else. Her concern was now focused solely on getting Jamie well again.

“Do you think you can eat something now maybe?” Dani asked and she held Jamie close to her.

“Maybe” Jamie replied softly.

Neither of the woman moved though, they just kept holding onto each other, not wanting to let go. Both of them were just relived that the other was okay.

For the rest of the day, Jamie and Dani laid snuggled up on the couch under a blanket whilst Mason watched a film and played. Jamie was getting stronger by the hour and when dinner time arrived, Dani insisted on doing the cooking even though Jamie had offered to do it herself as she was feeling better. 

The next morning when Dani logged on to teach her class, all she heard was a jumble of eager children asking her questions.

“Woah, guys, slow down, what’s wrong?” Dani asked, giggling a little at her students’ enthusiasm.

“How’s Jamie? Is she better?” one child asked, and Dani saw all the other students nod in agreement at the question.

“Oh, she’s fine now, she just had really bad tummy ache, but thanks for asking, I will tell her you were worried about her” Dani said, her heart swelling a little at how much her students cared about Jamie.

“Look, Miss Jessel said we could make Jamie get well soon cards yesterday” another child said, holding up a card he had made. The rest of the class followed suit and held up the cards they had made too.

“Oh, guys! Wow, this is amazing, thank you so much!” Dani said holding her hands to her chest in surprise at the very kind gesture. “If you all send me a picture of your cards, I will show Jamie tonight, I’m sure they will make her feel so much better”.

Dani did just as she’d promised and when she showed Jamie all the cards, she could have sworn that she saw Jamie’s eyes tear up just a little.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Jamie_e for the inspiration for this chapter! :)


	4. Date Nights

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might make a second part to this if people enjoy it, I still have a couple of cute date ideas! Hope you enjoy! :)

Friday nights were reserved for date nights only. No matter what had happened during the week or what was yet to come on the weekend, every Friday night Dani and Jamie would have a date night. 

At the start of their relationship, they had not wanted to have to reserve a specific date and time for them to spend time with each other. However, as they had gotten older, work had gotten busier and then Mason had come along, so it had grown harder and harder for them to spend time quality time together so, they had opted to schedule a weekly date night. 

Sometimes date night consisted of making dinner together after Mason had gone to sleep then sitting on the sofa to watch a film and other times date night consisted of getting a babysitter and going into town to try a new restaurant or bar that had opened. Either way, it didn’t matter what they did, as long as they got to spend some quality time together without any distractions, plus, it was fun coming up with new places to go and new things to see together.

However, since the start of lockdown, date nights had become less and less frequent. All the restaurants were closed, they couldn’t go anywhere except for the supermarket and they couldn’t even get a babysitter, so they were at a loss with what to do so, they had stopped doing anything at all. They had done the usual romantic meal at home and pretending they were at the cinema but after that, their ideas had run out fast.

As everyone was working from home, the days lacked a standard routine and so it wasn’t long before the usual weekly Friday night date night had gone out of the window and was replaced with a ‘date night’ whenever they found the time, which wasn’t very often.

Although it didn’t matter how they spent their time together on the rare occasion they had a date night, Jamie could sense that Dani was getting a little bored with the standard romantic meal together and if she was being honest with herself, so was she. They were both getting a little frustrated with having to stay inside all the time, they loved their house of course but the monotonous routine of never seeing anything else except the 4 walls of their house, had drove them a little crazy. However, one day Jamie had an idea that she hoped would change all that.

Jamie walked into Dani’s ‘classroom’, which was just their spare bedroom Dani had converted into a makeshift classroom at the beginning of lockdown, at 5pm one Friday night and placed a medium sized jar on the desk in front of her.

“What’s this?” Dani asked as her eyes were drawn away from her laptop and onto the jar in front of her. 

Dani let her curiosity get the best of her as Jamie remained silent and lifted the jar up to observe it. It was clear glass so she could see that there were pieces of paper folded up inside of it. She knitted her eyebrows and looked up at Jamie hoping she would answer her question.

“It’s a date night jar” Jamie stated simply as she placed her hands on Dani’s shoulders and started to give them a little massage.

Dani hummed at the sensation and leant her head back against Jamie’s abdomen. “A date night jar?” Dani asked as her eyes fluttered shut as Jamie continued her massaging.

“Yep, thought we should get back to our regular weekly date nights, we’ve both been pretty stressed out recently so I think it would do us some good. We shouldn’t have stopped in the first place, but we can try again, can't we?” Jamie said softly as she continued her massaging and placed a few kisses on the top of Dani’s head.

“How can we have date nights though, there’s nothing to do?” Dani said chuckling a little.

“Well, glad you asked. That’s where this jar comes in. I filled it up with date night ideas, courtesy of a quick Google search and a little hard thinking. Thought maybe you could just stick your hand in and pick one out at random? Or ya could just go through them all and pick out one you wanted to do, up to you, Poppins?”

“Jamie” Dani said feeling a little taken aback at the gesture before sitting up in her chair and reaching for the jar again to look at it, “That’s great idea, baby, I can't believe you filled it up will date ideas, you’re so adorable”.

Jamie just smiled softly as Dani stood up to hug her tightly. 

After Dani let go, she placed her hand on top of the jar like she was going to unscrew the lid and asked, “Can I pick one?”.

“Course you can, it’s Friday after all” Jamie said and winked at her wife who had already unscrewed the lid and had her hand in the jar as she eagerly rummaged around to find a slip of paper.

Dani chose one then pulled it out of the jar to read it. “Blanket fort” Dani said as she read the slip and furrowed her eyebrows. 

Jamie chuckled at the one her wife had picked. “Okay did I forget to mention that some of them were really cheesy?” Jamie said as she saw the slight puzzled look on Dani’s face, “We don’t have to do it if you don’t want to, you can pick another one.

“No!” Dani said laughing, “Sorry, did I not look excited, I was just trying to figure out the logistics is all. No, I love it! It’s a great idea!”

Jamie breathed a little sigh of relief as she realised Dani didn’t actually hate one of the very few ideas that didn’t come from Google. “Well, glad you like it, was a little worried there for a second but, don’t worry about the logistics, every in that jar we can do. If we didn’t have the supplies before, I may have ordered them, so you don’t have to worry about any of that, whatever you pick out it’s possible to do”.

“Jamie” Dani said giggling as she wrapped her arms around her wife again, “You’re so adorable, baby, I love you so much. And I love this idea so much too, I can't wait to see what the others are. Can we have a date night every night?”.

“Hey, my ideas are very limited so try not to use them all up at once, yeah” Jamie chuckling as she held onto Dani a little tighter. “And I love you so much too, Poppins” she whispered into Dani’s ear before kissing it.

“Okay” Jamie said as she removed her hands that were covering Dani’s eyes, “You can open them”.

Dani’s eyes excitedly shot open and darted around the living room.

“Jamie” Dani said softly, and she took in the site. Jamie had created a huge blanket fort in the centre of their living room and the ‘door’ was pealed back a little so she could see inside.

Dani walked closer to the fort as she observed it. Jamie had somehow managed to drag their mattress off of their bed and down the stairs so it now could form the base of the structure. Their duvet was on top of the mattress with their usually pillows and what looked like hundreds more dotted around the fort. Jamie had also hung up some fairy lights in the fort to so that they would still be able to see when she turned the lights out. 

“Jamie, baby” Dani said turning to face Jamie in amazement, “I can't believe you’ve done all this, I only put Mason to bed, and you build all this”.

Jamie just laughed softly and wrapped her arms around her wife, “Anything for you, baby” Jamie whispered before connecting their lips in a loving kiss.

They spent the rest of their night laid together in the fort. Jamie read some of her book for a little while as Dani made them some snacks. They then watch a film together before making the most of the privacy the fort offered them.

“I really needed this” Dani said as she rested her head on top of Jamie’s chest and intertwined their bare legs, “Thank you”.

“You’re welcome, baby” Jamie said as she ran her fingers softly up and down Dani’s back which was covered in a thin layer of sweat, “I really needed this too”.

“Can we stay here forever?” Dani whispered as she peppered light kisses onto Jamie’s collarbones and neck.

“If you wanna stay here forever, Poppins, that’s fine by me” Jamie said softly before placing a loving kiss onto Dani’s temple.

[1 week later]

“Outdoor cinema” Dani said as she read the small slip of paper in her hands that she had just pulled from the ‘Date Night’ jar. “How does that work?” she asked as she turned to look at Jamie who had a smirk on her lips.

“I said I bought supplies, didn’t I?” Jamie chuckled before walking out of the room, not giving anything away about her plans for the night.

“When you said you bought supplies, I thought you meant like an extra couple of blankets for the fort not a whole projector set thingy, whatever this is” Dani said in astonishment as Jamie took her into their back garden to show her the set up for their outdoor cinema date night. Jamie had set up the screen she had bought and the projector in the garden and placed two bean bags from Mason’s room opposite the screen. She had also turned on the garden LED lights she had bought a few weeks ago too.

Jamie just laughed as she watched Dani try to figure out what all the equipment was and how it all worked.

“When did you even buy this? And more importantly, where have you kept it hidden?” Dani said laughing as she couldn’t comprehend how Jamie could have hidden such a large screen from her.

“The screen does fold up by the way, so you don’t have to worry about it getting in the way, but if you must know, I hid it in the shed. You don’t really go in there so, that was the best bet I had of keeping it a secret” Jamie said chuckling as she sat on one of the two bean bags. 

“What else are you hiding from me in that shed, Mrs Clayton?” Dani said, half-jokingly, half seriously. 

“Guess you’ll never know because I'm the only one who has the key” Jamie smirked whilst patting the bean bag next to her so Dani would sit down next to her.

Dani lowered herself onto the bean bag and Jamie held her arm out so Dani could rest her head on her chest. Dani did as Jamie had gestured as they began to choose a film to watch. 

“Nothing scary, we’re literally sat outside in the dark, I don’t think I could handle watching a horror film too” Dani giggled as she snuggled in closer to Jamie as she watched her instantly skip to the horror section.

“You don’t need to worry Poppins, I’m here to protect ya. That’s why I put the lights on too, make it less scary for ya” Jamie said, pulling Dani closer to her and kissing her temple.

“I always feel safer with you, Jamie” Dani whispered into Jamie’s neck, “But still no horror films though”.

Jamie chuckled, “Okay, no horror, what about comedy then?”. 

They spent the rest of the night snuggled up on the bean bags outside, wrapped up in each other’s arms and a pile of blankets to keep the chilly night air off of them. 

“I really enjoyed tonight” Dani said as she took Jamie’s hand in hers as they walked into the house once the film had finished, “We should do this again sometime, maybe with Mason, I think he’ll love it”.

“Actually,” Jamie said as she turned her head to look at Dani, “We kinda already tried it out”.

“What?” Dani said, furrowing her eyebrows as she looked at her wife, “When?”.

“About a week ago now, you were upstairs doing a lesson so I knew you wouldn’t see us. Thought I’d try it out just in case you picked it out of the jar and Mason wanted to help so we set it up together then watched a couple of episodes of SpongeBob”. Jamie said smirking a little at Dani who was amazed that she had no idea any of that had happened.

“You’re both so sneaky, aren’t you? What else do you guys get up to whilst I'm working?” Dani asked as she pulled Jamie closer to her by her jacket.

“Guess you’ll never know” Jamie said as she took her bottom lip between her teeth before leaning in and kissing Dani on the lips lovingly.

Dani hummed into the kiss and pulled Jamie even closer into her then wrapped her arms around her waist. 

Jamie slipped both her hands under Dani’s jumper and squeezed her waist as she slipped her tongue into Dani’s mouth.

Dani moaned softly as she did so and pushed Jamie closer to the door.

When Jamie’s back hit the cold wood of the backdoor, she pulled away from Dani’s lips, opened the door and made her way inside. 

Dani was close behind and quickly turned around to lock the door before Jamie took her by the hand and lead her upstairs with a cheeky smirk on her lips.


	5. Date Nights (Part 2)

“Jamie!” Dani half groaned, half laughed as she read the small slip of paper in her hands.

“What?” Jamie chuckled as she tried to read the expression on her wife’s face to give her a clue as to what the slip said.

“A cookery class, really? Neither of us can cook, it’s going to be awful” Dani said laughing and placing the jar back on the shelf in their bedroom where it now lived.

“That’s why we are going to learn” Jamie said chuckling as she closed the gap between them and placed a sweet kiss on Dani’s lips.

The date nights had been going well so far. Over the past few weeks, they had a games night where they played Twister, Cluedo, Monopoly and a bunch of other games they had found in a cupboard. Dani had decided halfway into the night that they need some sort of prize at the end for whoever won the most games to give them some added incentive to win. Jamie had then come up with the idea that whoever won at the end of the night got to do whatever they wanted to the other when they went to bed. It was fair to say that Jamie’s prize definitely gave them a little more motivation to try and win and, in the end, it was Jamie who was triumphant, but Dani definitely didn’t feel like she had lost.

The week after, they dug out some of Mason’s art supplies and had a painting competition. Although neither of them were the best at art, they had a great time and the night had ended with both of them covered in paint after Jamie had started a paint fight. The morning after, when their masterpieces had dried, they stuck them to the doors of the kitchen cupboards next to some of Mason’s drawings. 

“Here” Jamie said as she moved to stand in front of Dani and place an apron she had in her hands over Dani’s head. She then wrapped her arms around Dani’s waist to tie the strings at the back whilst she connected their lips. When she had finished tying the bow, Jamie wrapped her arms all the way around Dani’s waist and squeezed her tightly as she kissed and bit her neck.

Dani giggled and let out a few unintentional soft moans as Jamie left little marks on the spot she knew Dani loved. “Okay, okay, do you want to learn how to cook or are we skipping the cooking all together and just doing the fun stuff?”.

Jamie reluctantly stopped what she was doing and moved her head so she could look at Dani. “This is going to be fun, obviously not as fun as what I’ll do to ya later, but that can wait, first we make an apparently easy pasta dish”.

Dani just giggled as Jamie kissed her lips softly before turning her attention to the pile of ingredients on the kitchen table next to them. Dani wanted nothing more than for Jamie to pick her up and sit her on the table and relieve the ache between her thighs, but she knew that would come later, she just needed to be patient. 

Dani straightened up her posture and smoothed down her apron as she tried to push those thoughts to the back of her mind before she joined Jamie in getting the ingredients ready.

“If we’re making a pasta dish, why don’t we have any pasta?” Dani asked as she scanned her eyes over the packets of food.

“We’re making our own” Jamie said smirking as she glanced at Dani out of the corner of her eye to see her facial expression. 

“Jamie!” Dani said groaning, “We aren’t going to be able to make our own pasta, we can barely make cereal”.

Jamie laughed and bumped her hip with Dani’s, “It’s going to be fun, I promise”. 

Jamie was right, it was fun. Although they had to make the pasta three times in order to get it right, they had a lot of fun doing it. Halfway through the final batch of pasta, Dani had left a floury handprint on the back of Jamie’s black jeans which caused a small flour fight to break out. 

Mason came wondering out of his room and downstairs to find the source of the screaming and laughing. When he entered the kitchen with one hand rubbing his eye and the other holding his beloved teddy bear that Jamie had bought him the day he was born, he saw Dani pinning Jamie to the fridge holding a handful of flour above her head. 

They both froze as they heard Mason say “Mummy, what are you doing?”. Dani instantly let go of Jamie and hid the handful of flour behind her back as Jamie moved away from the fridge and tried hard to hold in her laughter.

“We, erm, we were just, erm… Jamie?” Dani said trying to find the right words for what Mason had just seen before turning to Jamie for help.

“We were just play fighting, did we wake you?” Jamie said, not missing a beat as she run her hands though her hair to get the flour out of it and walked over to Mason.

He nodded and rubbed his eye again.

“Sorry, sweetheart” Jamie said as she picked him up. “Want me to put you back to bed?”.

Mason nodded again and rested his head on Jamie’s shoulder. 

Jamie walked Mason over to Dani who kissed him on the head and told him goodnight before whispering “I’ll be back in a minute” to Dani and winking at her.

Dani giggled and blew Mason a kiss as Jamie walked out the room. Mason smiled tiredly as he caught the kiss and put it in his pocket.

When Jamie walked back into the kitchen 10 minutes later after laying with Mason until he fell asleep again, Dani was stood at the kitchen island with a ball of pasta dough in her hands. 

“You made it without me?” Jamie chuckled as she walked over to Dani and kissed her cheek before observing the pasta dough.

“Maybe you were the one who kept messing up the dough because it went fine when I did it just now on my own” Dani said smirking a little.

“Okay, look at you Nigella Lawson” Jamie chuckled as she watched Dani begin rolling out the dough.

“Do you think I’m as hot as her?” Dani whispered, knowing Jamie only pretended to be interested in cooking just to watch Nigella.

“Is that even a serious question, Poppins?” Jamie said as she shifted to stand behind Dani and wrap her arms around her waist. “You’re like a million times hotter than her” Jamie whispered as she took Dani’s earlobe between her teeth and pulled gently.

The meal turned out really well, even though they took over double the amount of time the cooking video had stated. They ate their meal sat next to each other at the kitchen table with a few candles lit around the room.

“I really enjoyed that” Dani said as she finished the last mouthful of pasta and placed her fork down in the empty bowl.

“The pasta or making it?” Jamie asked as she wiped her mouth with a napkin.

“Both actually, it was fun to make everything from scratch. I still prefer using a jar and already made pasta, but it was fun to learn a new skill” Dani said as she reached for Jamie’s hand to hold.

“I’m glad you had fun because I did too, Poppins” Jamie said smiling widely before kissing the back of Dani’s hand. “Now… do you wanna do the part you were actually looking forward to, or…”.

Jamie didn’t even need to finish her sentence as Dani was already stood up and pulling her by the hand to lead them upstairs and into their bedroom.

[1 week later]

“Home spa” Dani read out loud and took her bottom lip between her teeth instinctively as she read the two words outloud.

Jamie smirked and ran her tongue over her lips. “Probably the one I was most looking forward to”.

Dani chuckled and lowered her head a little, so she didn’t have to look Jamie in her eyes which were already dark with desire. She knew it was going to be hard to get though dinner tonight.

“So, I ran us a bath if you wanna get in?” Jamie said when Dani walked into their bedroom after reading Mason a bedtime story and sitting with him until he fell asleep.

Dani smiled softly at Jamie who had now walked over to meet her. “That sounds lovely, baby”.

Jamie softly kissed Dani’s lips before pulling Dani’s jumper off her body. 

Whilst their lips were apart, Dani used that time to ask, “What else do you have planned for our evening at the Spa?”.

“You’ll just have to wait and see” Jamie whispered as she continued to slowly undress her wife.

Jamie always felt a little uncomfortable and slightly out of place at the Spa, so they didn’t often go together a lot. They had been a few times over the years, once on their first anniversary, once on their honeymoon and once on their 3rd wedding anniversary. Dani went a lot more often with a few of her friends from work and Jamie would happily stay at home and spend the day looking after Mason. However, Jamie was determined to make this Spa visit, the best one Dani has ever had.

Once they had both undressed each other, they walked into the bathroom that was joined to their bedroom. Jamie had run a nice warm bath with ample amounts of bubbles and rose petals floating in the water and had placed some small candles around the rim of the tub and had put a few larger ones in other places around the room.

“Big spoon or little spoon?” Jamie asked as she turned to look at Dani.

“Little” Dani whispered shyly as she kissed Jamie’s lips.

Contrary to what people may think, Dani was always the big spoon in bed. Although Jamie pretended to be all hard and tough on the outside, she was secretly a huge softie on the inside and loved nothing more than having Dani hold her whilst she slept. However, she also loved to hold Dani, so she was glad when Dani had wanted to be the little spoon for a change.

Jamie got into the tub first and sat down and a few seconds later, Dani was sat in front of her with her back resting against Jamie’s front. 

Jamie peppered small kisses along Dani’s shoulders and neck before tying Dani’s hair up for her in a bun.

“You’re so beautiful” Jamie whispered into Dani’s ear and she took hold of Dani’s hands and rested them on top of her stomach.

Over the years, Dani had learnt to take every compliment Jamie gave her regardless of if she felt it were true or not. At the beginning of their relationship, Dani would always brush off the compliments Jamie gave her, not believing what she was saying but Jamie had become insistent on Dani taking her compliments because in Jamie’s eyes, what she was saying was true, even if Dani struggled to see it for herself. So now, Dani would just smile shyly and let out a soft giggle in response.

As the pair sat in a comfortable silence, Jamie began kissing Dani’s neck which was now exposed thanks to the hair tie holding up Dani’s thick blonde locks.

Dani’s eyes fluttered closed as she let the sensation of Jamie’s lips of her neck and the warm water surrounding her, sooth and calm her.

After a while of soft gentle kisses, Jamie began to lick and suck and her hands moved up to Dani’s chest to caress her breasts. 

Dani let out soft moans as she felt an all too familiar ache between her legs begin to start.

“Jamie” Dani whispered softly as her desire for Jamie to touch her where she needed it the most got too much for her, “Please, Jamie”.

“Please Jamie what?” Jamie whispered into Dani’s ear, knowing full well what her wife wanted her to do.

“Touch me, please, Jamie, I need to feel you” Dani pleaded as her hips rose upwards slightly.

Jamie smirked at Dani’s comment and replied, “But I’m already touching you, baby”.

Dani groaned but smiled a little. She wasn’t in the mood for Jamie’s teasing so replied, “If you don’t touch me, I’ll just please myself”. With that Dani moved her hand from where it was tangled in Jamie’s hair to in between her legs.

Jamie’s hand quickly reached out to stop Dani’s hand from where she knew it was going but then stopped as she watched Dani’s hand dip beneath the water and a loud moan escape Dani’s mouth.

A wave of hot desire ran though Jamie as she watched Dani’s arm move under the water and listened as Dani’s moans echoed around the room. 

She let Dani continue for a while as she watched with wide eyes as her wife pleasured herself in front of her. Eventually, Jamie ran her hand down Dani’s arm that was between her legs and took over and when she did so, Dani let out such a loud moan that it shocked the both of them and Dani covered her mouth quickly with the hand that she had been touching herself with.

“I love your enthusiasm, baby but maybe try and keep it down a little, we have a 6-year-old a few doors away that we don’t wanna wake” Jamie whispered with a smirk on her lips as her fingers continued their movements.

Dani giggled a little before whispering, “Maybe you should cover my mouth then because I don’t think I keep quiet”.

Jamie’s eyebrows shot up at her wife’s remark but did as she said, and it wasn’t long before Dani was moaning her name whilst her whole body shook.

“You wanna give me the massage?” Jamie questioned as she looked at Dani who had now taken the small bottle of massage oil out of Jamie’s hands.

The pair had finished their bath and had dried each other off before putting on their PJs. Dani had put on one of her nightgowns that she reserved for ‘special nights’ as she called them, so Jamie knew the night wasn’t over yet.

“Yes. You hate going to the Spa so surely you should be the one getting the massage since you never get one. Plus, you’ve organised all these dates, let me do something for you for once” Dani said as she walked over to Jamie and kissed her lips before lifting Jamie’s old Blondie t-shirt over her head and gesturing for her to lay on the bed.

Jamie did as Dani asked and shifted a little to get comfy before she felt Dani crawl on top of her.

“You know that I’ll only have one thought on my mind while you do this, don’t you?” Jamie said as she felt Dani’s bare thighs on either side of her bare torso.

“I know, and we’ll get there don’t worry, just let me make you feel good another way first” Dani said before placing a small amount of oil in her hands, “Now just relax, okay”.

Jamie had never felt so relaxed in her whole life. It had felt like every ounce of tension had left her body as soon as Dani started to run her hands along her back. Small moans and sighs left her mouth when Dani’s hands hit a particularly tight spot and relieved the tension there. 

Dani was pretty proud of herself as she watched Jamie’s eyes flutter shut as her hands continued their work. She had never seen Jamie so relaxed and calm before, she was always the one to help Dani feel relaxed and Dani felt a little guilty for never returning the favour until now.

20 minutes later, Dani’s hands stopped, and she gently lifted herself off of Jamie’s body so she could lay next to her. Dani wrapped an arm around Jamie’s waist and kissed in between her shoulder blades.

“Could get used to ya doin’ that more often” Jamie whispered quietly.

Dani smiled widely and placed a kiss on the scar on Jamie’s shoulder, “Thought you had fallen asleep, baby”.

“Think I had for a second” Jamie chuckled as she rolled onto her side so Dani could wrap her arm around her properly.

“Think you’re up for round two, baby?” Dani whispered after a few moments of comfortable silence as her grip on Jamie’s waist became tighter.

“You know me, I’m always up for that, Poppins” Jamie chuckled as she rolled onto her back.

“Good, now just lay back and let me make you feel good okay, baby?” Dani said as she kissed Jamie’s lips softly before shuffling down the bed and placing herself comfortably between Jamie’s legs.

[1 week later]

“A picknick” Dani said smiling widely as she read the words written neatly on the piece of paper in her hands.

Dani loved picknicks and Jamie knew that, but she sighed heavily as she looked at the rain violently hit the glass of the window next to them.

Dani sensed Jamie’s frustration so said, “We can do it next week maybe, if the weather is better. I can pick another one for tonight”.

“No, it’s okay” Jamie said giving her wife a reassuring smile, “I came up with a backup plan just in case it rained, I just wanted to do something else as well as the picknick though, but we can do that another time maybe. We’ve never put an idea back in the jar have we and we’re not starting now. I’ll figure it out” Jamie said smiling widely before leaving the room and going to find what she needed from the shed.

“Oh, Jamie!” Dani said as she entered the room living room, “It’s beautiful!”.

Jamie smiled widely to herself as she looked around the room too. She had done a pretty good job given the change of plan. She had originally wanted to do an outdoor picknick as the sun was setting so that they could watch it set together, but she had had to adapt. She had laid their picknick blanket in the centre of the living room and had placed the picknick hamper in the middle along with a bunch of flowers. She had also hung a few strings of fairy lights around the room too and turned on the lamps at either end of the room instead of having the main light on. 

“I can't believe how you do all this date stuff in such a short amount of time” Dani giggled as she sat down on the blanket next to Jamie. 

Jamie just smiled as she opened the picknick hamper and pulled out a bottle of prosecco. 

“Want a glass?” Jamie asked.

Dani smiled and nodded before picking up the two champagne flutes that were in the hamper and holding them out as Jamie filled them up.

“What did you prepare for us to eat” Dani asked as she took a slip of her drink before peering into the hamper. 

“Okay, so I had a little trouble with that aspect of tonight. I kinda just packed random picknick things if I'm being honest but we can make it work. If there’s anything in particular you want, the kitchens right there” Jamie said chuckling and nodding her head in the direction of the kitchen.

“I’m sure we’ll be fine with whatever you’ve packed” Dani said lovingly as she smiled softly at Jamie.

Jamie then reached her hands into the hamper and pulled out a sandwich, a tub of hummus, carrot sticks, two babybels, a tub of mini sausage rolls and a tub of fruit.

“Oh my, this is so adorable” Dani said as she moved onto her knees to eagerly look at the food before offering a soft smile to Jamie.

“Oh, I almost forgot, I brought these too” Jamie said as she held up two cartons of Capri Suns.

“Oh my God” Dani said laughing as Jamie handed her one, “Mason’s going to be so annoyed we stole two when he doesn’t get one for his lunch tomorrow, we only had two left”.

“It’s fine, I bought another box the other day, he’ll be able to have his daily fix, don’t worry” Jamie said laughing as she pierced the straw through the carton and took a sip.

They then tucked into the selection of food Jamie had prepared whilst making light conversation with each other. When they had finished eating, they cleared the blanket so that they could lay down on it.

“Oh wait, give me a second” Jamie said as she stood up and jogged over to the other side of the room and came back holding a small projector.

“Oh my God, is that Mason’s old star projector?” Dani asked as Jamie plugged it in and turned it on.

“Sure is. I found it in the shed the other day. I did plan on us watching the sunset then doing a little stargazing, but this will have to do for now” Jamie laughed as she laid down on the blanket next to Dani. 

“We can always do that another night” Dani said as she laid her head on Jamie’s chest and wrapped her arm around her. “I think this is a cute idea though. Remember when we used to sit with Mason when he was little and watch them” Dani said as she watched the lights twinkle on the ceiling.

“Yeah” Jamie said chuckling, “We used to sit with him for hours while he just stared at the ceiling. He could be crying for hours on end but if we turned this thing on, he’d stop instantly, it was a lifesaver”.

Dani snuggled in closer to Jamie’s side and moved her hand to hold Jamie’s cheek.

There was a moment of silence before Dani said quietly, “How do you feel about us having another baby?”.

Jamie moved her head up a little so she could look at Dani, “Another baby, eh?”.

“It’s just, I've been thinking about it for a while now, well, probably ever since Mason was born really” Dani said giggling a little. “But for the past year, I think, I've been thinking about it a lot more. I thought that since Mason was a little older, now might a good time to have another one. You can say no, it’s fine, I won't be upset, it’s a big decision I know”.

There was a moment of silence as Jamie took some time to process what Dani had just said.

“I’d love to have another baby” Jamie whispered, the wide smile that was spread across her face was evident in her voice as she spoke.

“Really?” Dani said, trying to hide the excitement in her voice, but failing a little. 

Dani was now sat up a little and leaning both her arms on Jamie’s torso as she looked at her with pure joy in her eyes. 

“Really” Jamie stated with a big toothy grin. 

Dani quickly sat up and moved so she was satting on Jamie’s lap and Jamie sat up too to match Dani’s actions.

“I love you so much” Dani whispered as she placed her hands on Jamie’s cheeks and pulled her in to kiss her.

“I love you so much too, Poppins” Jamie chuckled when Dani pulled away for air.

“And for the record I would have still I loved you if you’d said no” Dani said seriously.

“I know” Jamie whispered as she wrapped her arms around Dani’s waist and pulled her closer.

“I’m so excited” Dani whispered as she rested her forehead against Jamie’s.

“Me too” Jamie whispered softly, “Except for the sleepless nights and the constant nappy changing.

Dani laughed loudly and as her head fell back, Jamie saw a few tears fall from her eyes which she reached out for and wiped away.

“Sorry, happy tears” Dani giggled.

“No need to apologise, baby” Jamie said smiling softly.

“You secretly loved night feeds and changing dirty nappies, didn’t you though? You always insisted on getting up in the night” Dani said chuckling.

“Yeah, I really did love it. It was just nice to sit in silence with him y’know, just me and him while I fed him, felt like I had a purpose. And the nappies, I mean it wasn’t the funniest of things to do but it just felt so good to be able to take care of him, it was kinda therapeutic in a way” Jamie said chuckling.

“You’re the best Mom in the world” Dani whispered as she kissed Jamie lovingly on the lips.

“No, that’s you” Jamie said softly before kissing the tip of Dani’s nose, which made Dani giggle.

“Shall we talk to Mason about it in the morning?” Dani said as she wrapped her arms around Jamie’s neck to hug her tightly.

“Yeah, pretty sure he won't be opposed to it, he loves babies” Jamie said as she remembered how excited Mason had been when they gifted him a baby doll for his birthday a few years ago which he still plays with to this day.

“Pretty sure a plastic doll is a little different to a real one who cries all the time and takes up a lot of our attention” Dani said laughing as Jamie kissed her collarbone.

“True, but we’ll see tomorrow”.

“Then maybe I could call the clinic? See if I can get us an appointment? I’m not sure what the whole protocol is now” Dani asked, her voice coming out a little more nervously than she had wanted it too.

“Sounds like a plan, Poppins” Jamie said as she lowered the both of them back down onto the blanket.

They spent the rest of the night tangled up together on the blanket in their living room staring up at the stars projected onto the ceiling as they discussed more of the practicalities of having another child.


	6. Exciting News

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I loved writing this chapter so I hope you all enjoy it!! :)
> 
> And thanks for all the positive feedback you've been giving, it means a lot!! :)

“How long has it been?” Dani asked nervously as she tapped her fingers on the bathroom counter impatiently. 

“Like 30 seconds” Jamie replied with a chuckle, “Just be patient, Poppins”. 

Jamie zipped up her jeans then walked over to the sink to wash her hands. 

“Ugh it’s taking forever” Dani groaned. 

“A watched pot never boils or whatever the saying is” Jamie said as she dried her hands on the nearest towel she could find before wrapping her arms around Dani from behind. 

“Are you nervous?” Dani asked as she leant back into Jamie’s embrace. 

“Not as nervous as you by the looks of it” Jamie giggled before placing a soft kiss to Dani cheek. 

“Come here” Jamie said as she turned Dani around, so that she was facing her.

“I just want it to work is all” Dani said smiling softly at Jamie who now had one hand on Dani’s hip and the other holding a biscuit to her mouth that she was eating.

“I know, baby, but it didn’t work last time. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up then be disappointed again” Jamie said softly as her hand that was resting on Dani’s hip rubbed the skin she found there soothingly.

“But this time is different, you have to be pregnant, you’ve been eating everything in sight for the past few days” Dani said giggling a little and motioning to the biscuit in Jamie’s hand that was at least her fifth one of the day so far.

“Or I'm just hungry” Jamie said as she pooped the remaining piece of biscuit into her mouth.

“I know you’re always hungry but you’re never this hungry” Dani said giggling as she watched Jamie eat the final piece of biscuit.

“I just don’t want you to be disappointed” Jamie whispered as she wrapped her arms around her wife’s neck to pull her closer, “Whatever this test says, we still have a beautiful family that we have made together, and we can still try again, okay?”.

“I know” Dani said softly as she pulled Jamie in tighter to her, “I love you so much”.

“I love you too, Poppins” Jamie said as she pulled away and placed a loving kiss on Dani’s lips before rubbing their noses together which caused Dani to let out a cute little giggle.

Jamie then reached behind Dani to pick up the pregnancy test that was laying on the bathroom counter.

As she pulled it closer to her so that she could read it, the smile that was once on her face had dropped.

Jamie just stared at the test with wide eyes as she read the word over and over again.

“What does it say?” Dani asked nervously as she tried to figure out what the test said by reading Jamie’s facial expressions.

“Pregnant” Jamie said in shock as she looked up at Dani, “I'm pregnant”.

Dani quickly wrapped her arms around Jamie and held her tightly as tears of joy fell down both of their faces.

“I love you so much” Dani said as she kissed Jamie’s neck a few times before she pulled away to look at her.

Dani wiped the tears falling from Jamie’s eyes with the pads of her thumbs as Jamie did the same to her.

“You’re pregnant” Dani whispered as she rested her forehead against Jamie’s.

“I’m pregnant” Jamie whispered back, the smile on her face growing wider as she spoke the words out loud for a second time.

“Can I?” Dani asked, lowering her hand to Jamie’s stomach.

“Yeah” Jamie chuckled as she wiped away some of the tears that were rolling down her cheeks.

Dani knelt down in front of Jamie and lifted her top up a little so she could place her palm on Jamie’s stomach.

“Hey little one” Dani said quietly as her thumb stroked the area of exposed skin which it was resting on, “It’s your Mommy, we’re so excited to meet you, I hope you’re doing okay in there”.

Jamie giggled at Dani’s words and felt her heart swell at the sight of Dani placing a loving kiss on her stomach. 

Jamie placed her hand on top of Dani’s and looked down at her. When their eyes met, they both felt their hearts flutter.

“I can't believe it” Dani whispered as she stood up and placed her hands on Jamie’s cheeks, “We’re having a baby again”.

That night, they put Mason to bed like they always did and read him a story together. Dani sat with him until he fell asleep whilst Jamie got ready for bed.

10 minutes later, Dani crept into their bedroom and found Jamie wrapped up under the duvet reading a book.

“Is he asleep?” Jamie asked as she looked up at Dani who was walking across their room.

Dani nodded and smiled as she pulled a book out from behind her back.

“What’s that?” Jamie asked as she squinted her eyes to try and make out the title.

“It’s the book you used to read to Mason when I was pregnant” Dani said smiling widely as she climbed into bed next to Jamie and handed her the book, “I thought that maybe I could read it to this one tonight”.

Jamie just smiled widely as she flicked through the book and remembered all the times that she had laid her head in Dani’s lap and read to book to her stomach.

“That’s a lovely idea” Jamie said as she handed the book back to a smiling Dani before she kissed her lips lovingly.

Dani took the book from Jamie and moved so that her head was resting in Jamie’s lap. 

“Hey” Dani said as she got comfy, “I’m going to read you a story, I hope that’s okay. Your Mummy used to read this to your big brother Mason when he was in my tummy, so I thought I’d do the same for you”.

A small tear rolled down Jamie’s cheek as she watched Dani talk to her stomach then place a soft kiss to it over her nightshirt.

Jamie lovingly played with Dani’s hair as she read the storybook out loud to their baby and every few pages, Jamie would place a soft loving kiss to Dani’s forehead and tell her how much she loved her.

Dani and Jamie had both agreed to wait until after their 12-week scan to tell Mason the good news as they wanted to make sure everything was normal and healthy before they told him.

“Hey kiddo” Jamie said as she sat down on the floor of the living room in front of Mason who was playing with some of his birthday gifts, “We’ve erm, we’ve got something to tell ya”.

Mason put down his truck and looked up at Jamie then at Dani who had sat down on the floor too, giving them his full undivided attention.

Mason had no idea Jamie was pregnant. Over the past few months Jamie had had pretty bad morning sickness and for the first few weeks Mason was a little worried. They had told him that Jamie just wasn’t feeling too well in the mornings, but it was nothing to worry about and that she would be fine soon. Mason had seemed to accept their explanation and was no longer as worried as he had been. 

However, he still sat with Jamie and placed his hand on her back as she threw up on the mornings that Dani was working and couldn’t be with her, but he didn’t cry like he used to. When the school year was over and Dani no longer had to do online learning, she was by Jamie’s side every morning to hold her hand and comfort her as she threw up and Mason never left her side either.

“A present?” Mason asked as Dani handed him a white box with a grey bow wrapped around it.

“Kind of” Jamie said as she smiled at Dani, “You can open it though”.

Mason wasted no time in pulling off the bow and lifting the lid off the box. He stared at the contents for a few moments with knitted eyebrows before he reached in and pulled out a photo and a t-shirt.

Jamie and Dani watched his facial expressions carefully as he observed the items, trying to tell if he understood what was going on.

Mason looked at the picture but couldn’t make out what it was, so he picked up the t-shirt instead and tried to read out what it said.

“Soon to be… big brother” Mason read out carefully.

He knitted his eyebrows and looked at Jamie and Dani who were sat watching him with eager eyes, for reassurance.

Soon enough the penny dropped, and Mason’s knitted eyebrows loosened, and a small smile appeared on his face.

“I’m a big brother?” Mason asked, still a little unsure if he had inferred the t-shirt correctly.

“You sure are, well, you will be soon” Jamie said smiling widely at Mason.

“We’re having a baby” Dani said grinning from ear to ear, “Look, can you see them?”.

Dani reached out and held up the scan picture for Mason to look at.

Mason’s eyebrows furrowed a little and he squinted his eyes as he tried to find what could be his new sibling.

“Come here” Jamie said as she patted her knee.

Mason happily accepted the invitation and sat himself carefully on Jamie’s knee.

“Look, that’s their head” Dani said pointing to the picture, “And this is their arms and legs”.

Mason giggled as he finally started to be able to make out the baby in the picture. “They look funny” he said laughing as she moved his face closer to the picture to have a better look.

“Are you excited?” Jamie asked a little nervously.

“Yeah!” Mason said as she turned to look at Jamie with a wide smile on his face, “I’ve always wanted to be a big brother. I can teach them how to ride a bike, and how to play football and I can help look after them”.

Jamie wiped a single tear from her cheek and laughed as she heard Mason talk about being a big brother. 

“You’re going to be the best big brother in the world, I can already tell” Jamie said softly before kissing his cheek.

“I second that” Dani said, wiping her own tears from her cheeks as she leant forward and kiss his head.

“Do you want to say hello?” Jamie asked as she looked down at her stomach that was starting to look more like a bump with every passing day.

Mason nodded slowly but his face looked a little nervous as he turned around to look at Jamie.

“No need to be nervous, sweetheart” Jamie said softly as she sensed Mason’s apprehensions.

Mason knelt in front of Jamie and moved a little closer to her stomach. He reached out a tentative hand before he looked up at Jamie, silently asking if it was okay to touch.

Jamie nodded at him and smiled widely, reassuring him that his actions were okay.

“Hello” Mason whispered as he placed his hand gently onto Jamie’s stomach over her top.

Dani reached over and took hold of Jamie’s hand and intertwined their fingers as they watched Mason with wide smiles on their faces.

“I’m Mason, I am your big brother” Mason whispered as he got closer to Jamie’s stomach, “I can't wait to play with you, I hope you like football”.

Jamie wiped the tears that were falling fast down her cheeks as she smiled widely at Mason.

Dani did the same before kissing Jamie’s cheek softly.

“He’s going to be a great brother, isn’t he?” Dani whispered as she placed another soft kiss to Jamie’s cheek.

“Yeah” Jamie chuckled, “He really is”.


	7. Weird Cravings, Furniture Building and a Zoom Baby Shower

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really enjoyed writing this so I hope you all enjoy it!! 
> 
> And thank you to Jamie_e, anafrndz37 & Winter_Daze for the ideas!! :)

Jamie was now 4 months pregnant and still had an insatiable appetite that didn’t seem to be going away. Her morning sickness was slowing down thankfully but there were still some mornings that were spent hunched over the toilet, bringing up last night’s dinner. Jamie’s food cravings had gotten weirder and weirder and Dani was almost certain that it was those causing her morning sickness and not the actual pregnancy. Surely gherkins covered in peanut butter can't do a person any good when consumed at 2am.

Late night snacking for Jamie had become a regular thing and every few nights she would wake up with craving so strong that she had no choice but to satisfy them. The bottom draw of her nightstand had been cleared out and was now full of packaged sweets and crisps and anything else that she had been craving that week, but one night, she craved more than just a chocolate digestive.

Jamie groaned softly as she woke up and stretched her arm out to find Dani. Her fingers brushed past soft skin and Jamie smiled when her hand landed on Dani’s thigh behind her. 

Jamie let out another soft groan as she heard her stomach rumble. She turned her head to look at the clock on her nightstand and read the time: 2:14am. She sat up a little in bed then bent down to rummage through her snack draw but there was nothing she wanted. The sight of the packet of chocolate digestives suddenly making her feel nauseous. 

Jamie sighed before getting out of bed, making sure not to disturb her wife who was peacefully sleeping next to her. Dani had grown used to the rustle of packets and the sounds of Jamie munching in the middle of the night so she would often sleep through Jamie’s midnight snacking. On the odd occasion, Dani would wake up, roll over and ask Jamie if she was okay and Jamie would whisper a yes before offering Dani whatever she was eating which Dani would politely decline before wrapping an arm around her wife and falling back to sleep.

Jamie made her way into the kitchen and began opening all the cupboards to see if there was anything that would satisfy her unknown craving. 

“Mac and cheese” Jamie whispered and smiled widely as her eyes landed on the pasta elbows in the cupboard. 

She reached up for the packet then stopped as a frown formed on her face. Jamie had no idea how to make mac and cheese. She had hated the thought of it until tonight so had never paid attention to Dani when she made it for her and Mason.

“Shit” Jamie whispered as she pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and sat down. She was torn, does she wake Dani up and ask her to make her mac and cheese or does she just find something else that might dull the craving until tomorrow? Jamie sighed as she realised that this insatiable desire for a dish which she had hated all her life wasn’t going away so she climbed the stairs and made her way into her and Dani’s bedroom.

“Dani?” Jamie whispered as she bent down to whisper into her wife’s ear, “Baby?”.

Dani groaned and turned her head towards Jamie’s voice, “You okay?” Dani said, her voice thick with sleep.

“Can you make me mac and cheese please?” Jamie whispered shyly as she looked down at her hand on Dani’s arm to avoid any possible eye contact with the blonde.

Dani’s eyes narrowed, even though they were still closed, “Mac and cheese?”.

Jamie nodded, “Yeah, baby wants it, and I don’t know how to make it, sorry”.

Dani just giggled and opened her eyes to look at her wife “You’re so adorable” Dani said softly before pulling Jamie’s face down to her kiss her on the lips.

“Okay, so” Dani said as she poured the boiling water into the pan with the pasta, “Just add boiling water and let them cook. They shouldn’t take too long, maybe like 15 minutes, but you can keep checking them with a fork”.

Jamie nodded as she stood beside Dani eating a gherkin as Dani taught her how to make mac and cheese.

“I can always write the recipe down for you, or I could make it in a large batch for you and freeze it if you want, then all you’d have to do is heat it up?” Dani suggested as she began making the cheese sauce. She noticed Jamie losing interest in learning how to make the dish as she wondered around the kitchen looking in different cupboards.

“Whatever happened to the peanut butter? Baby wants peanut butter, maybe we could add it to the cheese sauce? That could be nice” Jamie said after she had looked in every cupboard.

“We threw it out remember? You ate nothing but that for a whole week then couldn’t stand to look at it again, so we had to throw it out” Dani said giggling a little as she turned away from the stove to look at Jamie who now had her face scrunched up as she ate another gherkin. 

“Really? I asked ya to throw ‘em out?” Jamie asked, as she couldn’t for the life of her remember that ever happening.

“Yeah” Dani giggled, “Every time you walked in here, you swore you could smell it, so I had to throw all the jars away”.

“Fuck, I could just devour a tub too” Jamie groaned as she sat down at the kitchen table. 

“I’ll add it to our order tomorrow” Dani said walking over to Jamie and kissing the top of her head, “Or if you really really really want it, I’ll go and get you some in the morning”.

“Thanks baby” Jamie said as she turned to face Dani so she could connect their lips.

Online shopping had proven difficult as they would order one set of food that Jamie was craving and two days later, those cravings were gone and replaced by another set of cravings which Dani had to order again. Instead of one shop a week, it was turning into 2 or 3 shops a week, but Dani didn’t mind, she would do anything to keep Jamie and their baby happy. The delivery man who brought their order every few days did seem a little confused by the frequency and contents of their orders though.

“Fuck, that’s so good, baby” Jamie said as she leant back in her chair and let her eyes flutter shut for a moment, “Fuck, that hit the spot”.

Dani just giggled as she kissed Jamie’s cheek, “Glad you like it, baby, there’s more in the pot if you want it”.

“Sorry if I ever said anything mean about ya mac and cheese, it's really good” Jamie said as she took another bite of Dani’s infamous dish.

“You’re forgiven, sweetheart” Dani said sitting down next to Jamie and leaning into her side.

“Do ya want some?” Jamie said offering Dani a spoonful of mac and cheese and a gherkin.

Dani shook her head and smiled, “It’s all for you, baby”.

Dani and Jamie sat in silence for a few minutes with Dani’s head resting on Jamie’s shoulder as Jamie ate her food.

Dani suddenly shot up and opened a cupboard nearby and rummaged to the back and pulled out a jar of peanut butter and held it above her head.

“I knew I hid one, but I just couldn’t remember where” Dani said smiling brightly, but her eyes revealing just how tired she really was.

“Oh my God” Jamie said smiling widely as Dani handed her the jar before giving her a spoon, “I love you so much Dani Clayton!”.

Jamie couldn’t wait to get the lid off the jar and dip her spoon in. As she popped the spoon into her mouth, she let out a loud moan that took Dani a little by surprise.

“Okay, steady on, baby” Dani said giggling as she sat back down next to her wife, “That’s my job to get you to make sounds like that, not peanut butter. I almost regret giving it to you now”.

Jamie just laughed as she got a spoonful of peanut butter and mixed it in with her mac and cheese.

“I don’t think ya have to be worried about peanut butter taking ya job baby” Jamie said chuckling as she leant forward to kiss Dani.

“And that’s the last time you’re kissing me tonight too, I'm not kissing you goodnight if you taste like mac and cheese, peanut butter and gherkins” Dani said seriously as she pulled away from the kiss and frowned as she tasted her lips.

Jamie just frowned and pouted “One more than? Please?”.

Dani just giggled and reconnected their lips in a loving kiss before she pulled away and rested her head back on Jamie’s shoulder and placed her hand gently on her baby bump that was growing larger by the day.

-

“Flatpack furniture should be illegal” Jamie groaned as she sat on the floor of their spare bedroom surrounded by pieces of wood that were meant to somehow be put together to form a cot.

Dani and Jamie had just begun to turn their spare bedroom, that had once acted as Dani’s makeshift classroom, into a nursery. They had agreed that if Dani still needed to use it as a classroom in September, then she could do as the baby wasn’t due until February, but they wanted to get a head start on decorating it before Jamie was too tired to help out.

They had already painted the walls the week before and the first piece of furniture that they had bought was a cot. They had plenty of time to buy things for the room, but they had stumbled upon the cot online one day when they had been browsing and had fallen in love with it so, had decided to buy it. They hadn’t realised at the time that it would come in millions of pieces with very unhelpful instructions, but it gave them something to do to pass the time.

Dani sat down next to Jamie on the floor and kissed her cheek before resting her chin on Jamie’s shoulder to have a look at the instructions. 

“For one baby, it might help if you had the instructions the right way around” Dani said giggling and turning the paper around before placing another kiss on Jamie’s cheek, “And yes, flatpack furniture should be illegal, or it should at least come with more than just an A4 sheet of poorly made instructions”.

Usually, Dani and Jamie would just either hire someone or get one of their friends to help them build whatever they had bought, but the current restrictions made that impossible and neither of them wanted to risk anyone coming into the house anyway so, they just had to figure it out.

“It was light outside when we started” Jamie said as she stood up and looked out of the window to see the sun had already set, “And we still haven’t finished”.

Dani just laughed as she stood up too and went to wrap her arms around her wife from behind and place her hands on Jamie’s ever growing bump, “We can finish it tomorrow if you want, I should make dinner”.

“No, we’re almost done, we can finish it off later” Jamie said as she turned around to kiss Dani on the lips.

“Okay, just go and have a rest. Is there anything in particular you want for dinner?” Dani asked as she wrapped her arms around Jamie’s neck and started to play with her hair that was in a tiny bun at the back of her neck.

Jamie hummed for a second as she thought about Dani’s question, “Tacos”.

“Tacos it is then” Dani said smiling before she placed a final kiss on Jamie’s lips before turning around and going to leave the room, “Have rest, I’ll shout you when dinners ready”.

Jamie smiled at her wife and nodded before taking a seat in the armchair in the corner of the room that they used to sit on in Mason’s room when he was a baby.

Half an hour later, Dani made her way up the stairs and into their bedroom to try and find Jamie. She had expected to find her there as she wasn’t downstairs or in the bathroom but she wasn’t in their bedroom either. As Dani peered around the slightly ajar door to the nursery, she saw Jamie asleep on the chair in the corner.

A loving smile spread across Dani’s lips as she walked closer to her wife who was snoring softly. Dani gently lifted Jamie’s legs up and placed the stool that went with the chair under her feet before placing a soft kiss to Jamie’s forehead carefully enough so that it wouldn’t wake her up. 

Jamie had been finding it a little hard to sleep recently as her bump was getting bigger and bigger each day and it was making it hard for her to get comfy in bed. Jamie had always slept on her stomach but ever since her bump had started to show, that had become impossible. Dani had tried many different sleeping positions with Jamie but not many of them allowed her to get a good night’s sleep so she couldn’t help but smile widely when she saw Jamie happily snoring away.

Dani stood in silence for a few moments as she watched Jamie sleep with a soft smile on her lips. It had become one of her favourite things to do recently. Jamie always seemed to wake up before her, so she usually got the pleasure of watching Dani sleep in the mornings but ever since Jamie had become pregnant, she seemed to take more and more naps throughout the day which gave Dani the chance to be able to watch her. She loved the way Jamie always looked so peaceful and relaxed when she slept and the constant lines that were always on her forehead from the numerous facial expressions that she made throughout the day would smooth out and vanish. 

Dani decided to let Jamie sleep a little while longer so placed another soft kiss to her forehead before leaving the room and heading back downstairs to give Mason his dinner.

“I love you, baby” Dani whispered softly in Jamie’s ear before she left.

-

Dani and Jamie didn’t really care about the sex of their baby, it made no difference to them, just as long as they had a happy and healthy baby, that was all they cared about. They hadn’t wanted to find out the sex when Dani was pregnant with Mason and had waited until he was born to find out. However, the second time around, Jamie wanted to know. She had a hunch that their baby was a boy, and she would often refer to them as he whenever she talked about them. On the other hand, Dani was certain Jamie was having a girl. Dani had had a boy and her bump was a different shape to Jamie’s, so she was certain that she was having a girl so, when Jamie went for her second scan, they had decided that they wanted to know. It didn’t matter who was right and who was wrong, just as long as they had a healthy baby, but the desire to prove the other wrong was stronger by the day.

They had asked if the nurse could write down the sex of the baby and put it in an envelope for them which she did very willingly and smiled widely when they said that they were going to have a zoom baby shower.

They had had a baby shower when Dani was pregnant with Mason instead of a gender reveal as they didn’t want to know the baby’s sex beforehand, but as they couldn’t have a proper baby shower in the current circumstances, they had opted on a small celebration over zoom where they would tell everyone the sex of the baby, have a few drinks and then have a fun baby themed quiz to end the night. It had been hard being isolated from the people close to them, especially now that Jamie was pregnant, but this was the best they could do given the circumstances and they thought that it would cheer their friends and family up just as much as it would them.

They sat on the sofa a few days later with a selection of snacks and orange juice for Jamie and Mason and a glass of wine for Dani. They waved and smiled as each one of their friends and family popped up on the screen in front of them. They had invited Hannah and Owen who Dani and Jamie used to work with, Henry, Flora and Miles who Dani and Jamie used to work for and Dani’s Mom. 

“So, are we placing bets before you start?” Owen asked which earned him a playful push on his arm from Hannah.

“We are not placing bets on a child’s sex, Owen” Hannah said then apologised on his behalf which caused everyone to laugh.

“Well, I think it’s a boy so I’m just putting it out there before if I’m not allowed to place a bet on it” Owen said laughing as his comment earnt him another playful push from Hannah.

“Me too” Henry said to which Miles and Flora both agreed.

“Well, I think it’s a girl” Hannah said.

“I thought you didn’t want to place a bet” Owen said cheekily as she smirked at Hannah.

“We’re not betting, I’m allowed to say what I think the baby might be” Hannah replied shooting Owen a disapproving look.

“I’m with you on that one, it would be nice if I had a granddaughter, I loved having a baby girl” Dani’s Mom said as she nodded at Hannah’s comment.

“And what do you think Mason?” Owen asked with a cheeky smile on his face as he assumed that Mason would want a baby brother.

“A girl” Mason responded with a smile on his face, “I want a sister”.

Everyone couldn’t help but smile widely at Mason as he answered Owen’s question in a quiet voice with a shy smile on his face.

“Well, since you all placed your bets anyway” Dani said laughing as she kissed the top of Mason’s head, “We might as well tell you then”.

Dani picked up the envelope from the table and reached out the hold Jamie’s hand.

“Do you wanna do the honours?” Dani asked as she handed Jamie the envelope.

Jamie took a deep breath in and squeezed Dani’s hand before she opened the envelope. 

Dani kissed her lips before Jamie took out the paper.

Both closed their eyes for a few seconds and squeezed each other’s hands before Jamie unfolded the paper and they read it together.

Both their faces lit up as they read the word neatly scribbled on the piece of paper in front of them as the room became silent with anticipation from those waiting for the answer on the zoom call.

Jamie leant over and showed the piece of paper to Mason who threw his arms above his head and shouted in excitement “Girl!”.

Everyone on the zoom call cheered whilst Jamie, Dani and Mason hugged each other tightly. 

“I told you” Dani whispered cheekily into Jamie’s ear as she pulled her in tighter and kissed her ear.

Jamie just rolled her eyes playfully and kissed Dani’s lips, “I knew you would be right, you always are”.


	8. Constant Crying, Baby Blankets and A Foot Massage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you all enjoy this chapter and thank you to Jamie_e & anafrndz37 for the ideas!! :)

Jamie hardly ever cried. On the odd occasion when she was extremely stressed or upset, she cried, and Dani was always there to hold her and comfort her as she knew that something big must of happened to make Jamie cry. Jamie used to cry a lot when she was younger but ever since Dani had come into her life, there wasn’t much need to cry. She would of course let out the occasional happy tear once in a while but that wasn’t exactly crying. However, since she had gotten pregnant, everything seemed to make her cry.

Dani loved this unexpected consequence of Jamie being pregnant. Of course, she had noticed that she had been a little more emotional when she was pregnant with Mason, but she had just assumed that it was because she was quite emotional anyway and the hormones must of just heighted it. However, she hadn’t expected the same to happen to Jamie, but she loved it.

The first time it had happened, Dani hadn’t thought much of it but soon enough, Jamie was starting to cry at everything.

“Do you want anything?” Dani asked as she got up off the couch to go and get herself a glass of water whilst the adverts were playing on TV.

“Nah, I'm good” Jamie replied as she shifted a little to accommodate Dani being gone from beside her.

Dani was back within a minute and sat back down beside Jamie who then laid her head on her shoulder.

Dani picked up her phone from the side and began scrolling through her notifications when she heard a few sniffles come from Jamie. She didn’t think much of it and carried on scrolling but then a few more sniffles happened before she heard soft whimpers, so she turned and looked down at Jamie who was wiping tears from her eyes. 

“Hey, baby, what’s wrong?” Dani asked, the concern evident in her voice.

Jamie just continued to wipe her tears away as she watched the TV screen.

“Jamie, hey, what happened?” Dani asked again, her eyes never leaving Jamie’s face.

“Fuck, I'm sorry” Jamie said a few moments later as she sat up a little to wipe her cheeks.

“Hey, no, it’s fine, are you okay, what’s wrong?” Dani asked again, her voice thick with worry now as Jamie wouldn’t answer her question.

“Nothing, just that advert, it seemed to set me off for some reason. Fuck, it was only a McDonald’s advert too” Jamie said chuckling a little as she continued to wipe the few stray tears that were falling from her eyes.

“Come here” Dani said giggling as she let out a sigh of relief that it wasn’t anything more serious, “You’re so cute, do you know that? I love you so much”. 

Jamie let her body be pulled back into Dani’s and she gently laid her head onto Dani’s chest as her tears started to slow.

Dani was usually always there to comfort Jamie when she would start crying and Jamie’s tears would soon dry up as Dani held her tight and whispered calming things into her ears, but when Dani wasn’t there, Jamie could never seem to stop crying.

“How’s it going?” Owen asked as he made his way from his kitchen to sit on his sofa.

He and Jamie facetimed at least once a week, if not more. They used to have a couple of beers and sit in their respective gardens whilst they chatted over the phone but ever since Jamie had gotten pregnant and the weather had turned colder, they had opted for a cup of tea and a chat on the sofa instead.

“Good, yeah. It's kinda annoying having to carrying her around like this, she’s getting a little heavy now but I’m liking it. Dani keeps waiting on me hand and foot so that’s pretty fun” Jamie said as she ran her hand across her stomach and smiled, “But this one keeps making me forget stuff though” she said pointing to her bump, “Suppose that’s kinda annoying too”.

Owen just laughed as he sat back and rested his feet on the table whilst Hannah wasn’t in the room, “What’s she doing, absorbing your memories or something?”.

Jamie laughed loudly and took a sip of her caffeine-free tea before she pulled her face a little at the taste, “Feels like it yeah. I swear I hardly remember anything now. Dani has to keep writing me post-it notes and sticking them on the fridge like I'm 90 years old”.

Owen just laughed again and shook his head “Have you got baby brain or just early onset dementia?”.

“Honestly Owen, I am starting to wonder if it’s the latter” Jamie chuckled, “I forgot to water me plants the other day and I even forgot to give Mason his lunch when Dani was working”.

Owen laughed, “God, you’re such a bad Mother” Owen joked as he continued to laugh.

Suddenly the smile dropped from Jamie’s face and tears welled in her eyes and it wasn’t long before they were falling thick and fast down her cheeks.

“Shit” Owen said as he sat up quickly and moved closer to his phone, “I was only joking, I'm so sorry, I didn’t actually mean it”.

“I know, sorry, fuck I also cry for no reason too” Jamie said quickly wiping the tears from her face and chuckling a little.

“No, totally my fault, I shouldn’t have said that. You’re an amazing Mum Jamie, you really are, the kids are so lucky to have you” Owen said sincerely, hoping to try and stop the tears that were still falling thick and fast down Jamie’s face.

“No, I know, it’s fine honestly, I know you were just joking. Sorry, I just cry at everything now, it wasn’t your fault” Jamie said, still trying to control her tears “It’s just that I felt like a pretty shitty Mum that day and I reminded meself of me Mum when she forgot to feed us and-”.

“Hey” Owen said, cutting Jamie off, “You’re nothing like your Mum, nowhere near and you know that. She was nothing like the kind of Mum you are to Mason and will be to that one that’s on its way. You’re incredible, you really are and don’t ever compare yourself to her ever again, your nothing alike”.

Jamie couldn’t help the fresh flow of tears that fell as Owen spoke and his words meant more to her than she could ever express in words. “Thanks” she whispered through her tears as she gave Owen a grateful smile.

“I wish I could give you a hug” Owen said softly as he looked down at his phone to see a still crying Jamie.

“Yeah, me too” Jamie chuckled.

“Shit, did Jamie Taylor just say that she wanted to hug me? Pregnancy has softened you, hasn’t it?” Owen chuckled, trying his best to lighten the mood, “Where’s Dani?”.

“Shut up” Jamie said as she laughed, her tears still falling, “She’s at the park with Mason, shouldn’t be too long now why?”.

“Thought she might be able to give you a hug for me” Owen said smiling, “Don’t want you to keep crying. I feel bad that there’s nothing that I can do to help”.

“Sorry” Jamie said laughing, “But if it makes ya feel any better, they’re happy tears. And also, I think Dani’s the only one who can stop me crying, so don’t take it personal”.

Owen just laughed and sat back on the sofa and put his feet back on the table, “Well, I’ll stay with you until she comes back then, can't have you sat alone on the sofa crying, can we?”.

____

“Hey” Dani said as she crept into their bedroom one night after putting Mason to bed, “I've got you a present”.

When Dani was pregnant with Mason, she had wanted to make him a baby blanket. She had wanted to make it sentimental but had no idea how until her and Jamie had cleared out their wardrobe and found a stack of blankets that they had when they had lived in their first apartment together. The heating in that apartment hadn’t worked properly no matter how many times the repair man had come and looked at it so, they had built up quite the collection of blankets which they would spend hours together cuddling under to keep each other warm. So, that’s what Dani had made Mason’s baby blanket out of and he still used it now, seven years later.

Since Mason had loved his blanket so much, Dani had decided to make another one for their daughter. Dani had contemplated making one out of the old blankets that they still had but when she found a pile of old t-shirts that Jamie had told her to throw away, she had an idea. 

“A present?” Jamie asked as she put her book down and looked up at Dani who was walking over to her.

Dani hummed in response than climbed over Jamie and sat beside her. “Here” Dani said as she handed Jamie a large rectangular box.

Jamie gave her wife a suspicious look before taking the box out of her hands and placing it on her knee.

“What is it?” Jamie asked as she placed her hands on either side of the lid.

“Just open it” Dani said smiling widely in anticipation.

Jamie lifted the lid and placed it on the bed before picking up the item inside.

Dani studied her wife’s face closely as Jamie picked up the blanket and began looking at it.

“Dani” Jamie whispered after a few seconds, “It’s beautiful”.

Dani just grinned at Jamie as she leant her head on her shoulder, “I’m glad you like it”.

“Dani, it’s incredible, I love it” Jamie said softly as she stared in amazement at the blanket in her hands.

“I used the old t-shirts you told me to throw away. I thought they had too many memories attached to them to just be put in the trash so, I made a baby blanket out of them. Hopefully she’ll like it just as much as Mason likes his”.

“Dani” Jamie whispered as she turned to face Dani who lifted her head off of her shoulder, “I love you so much”.

Dani just giggled and connected their lips lovingly as she wiped away a few tears that had fallen from Jamie’s eyes.

“I love you too, sweetheart” Dani whispered against Jamie’s lips as she kissed her again.

Jamie laid her head on Dani’s shoulder whilst they looked at the baby blanket together and remembered where they had acquired each t-shirt from. Most were from concerts and festivals that they had been to together or places that had travelled to over the years.

“Do you remember that weekend?” Dani laughed as she ran her thumb over a patch from a t-shirt that they had bought at Glastonbury 10 years ago.

“Like yesterday” Jamie groaned, “I've never been so embarrassed in my entire life. I can't believe we spent all that money on tickets for me to spend half the weekend vomiting in a porta-loo”.

Dani just laughed loudly and kissed the top of Jamie’s head, “But we had so much fun though, when you weren’t vomiting obviously”.

“Yeah” Jamie chuckled, “Yeah we did”.

____

“Fuck” Jamie groaned as she waddled over to the sofa to sit next to Dani, “My feet are fucking killing me”.

Jamie had been in the flower shop all day making orders for customers. Since the infection rates had increased again in England, she had opted to close her shop again and only do telephone orders since that was probably what was going to happen again if the Government put the country back into lockdown. 

Jamie thought it would have affected her business not allowing people to just come in off the street and buy what they wanted but it hadn’t really. Obviously, trade wasn’t what it used to be pre-pandemic, but it wasn’t exactly bad either, the shop was still making money and Jamie was glad about that, having a baby wasn’t cheap. Her customers had been quite understanding of her situation and her decision to stop customers coming into her shop and were happy to order what they wanted over the phone. Some of her older customers were especially understanding as they couldn’t leave their houses anyway to get to her shop and were very thankful when Jamie would drop their orders off at their doors for them along with a few essentials.

“You’re so adorable” Dani said as she watched with adoration as Jamie waddled towards her.

Jamie was now almost 7 months pregnant and her ever growing stomach was causing her to waddle slightly when she walked.

Jamie sat down on the sofa and Dani moved to the other end. “Hey, do I smell or something?” Jamie said, furrowing her eyebrows at Dani’s action.

Dani just laughed, “Here, give me your feet, I’ll rub them for you”.

Jamie just smiled and happily moved her feet onto Dani’s lap and laid back against the arm rest. 

“You need to stop working so hard, or at least sit down every now and again. I know what you’re like, you’ll just say you’re fine and then you’ll come home and not be able to walk all night” Dani said as she took Jamie’s socks off that she had put on for her that morning. Jamie could no longer bend down now so Dani was the one who would put her shoes and socks on for her each morning.

“Fuck” Jamie said softly as her head fell back a little as Dani started to massage her foot, “God, that’s good, baby”.

Dani just chuckled and continued her work. She loved taking care of Jamie as it was usually the other way around and she cherished every moment when Jamie asked her to do something for her.

Dani watched as Jamie’s eyes fluttered shut and her lips parted slightly so that she could release soft moans as Dani’s thumbs removed the tension from her feet. She couldn’t help the flips her stomach did ever time another soft moan left Jamie’s mouth.

“Someone’s got a little excited” Dani chuckled as she heard a few louder moans and groans leave Jamie’s mouth as her thumb landed on a particularity sore part of Jamie’s foot.

Jamie just let out soft chuckle at Dani’s comment but kept her eyes shut and head back.

“Got anymore tension anywhere else you want me to help you with?” Dani whispered as she pushed her thumb hard into a spot on Jamie’s foot that caused another moan to fall from Jamie’s lips.

Jamie just smirked and nodded, “Yeah, I do actually now that you’ve mentioned it”.

“Oh really?” Dani said, moving her hands away from Jamie’s foot and onto her legs.

“Mmh, yeah” Jamie said softly as she opened her eyes to look at her wife whose eyes were now dark with lust, and her lips were turning into a smirk.

“Where abouts, baby?” Dani whispered softly as she sat up on her knees to face Jamie who was still laid on the couch.

“I think you know where” Jamie chuckled as Dani’s hands ran up and down her legs softly, getting higher each time.

“I think I do” Dani whispered as she placed delicate kisses along Jamie’s legs, starting on her shins and ending on the inside of her thighs.

Dani then placed her hands on Jamie’s shorts and gently pulled them down her legs as she left another trail of kisses up and down her legs.

“No underwear tonight?” Dani chuckled as she discarded the shorts to the side and began placing more delicate kissed onto the inside of Jamie’s thighs.

“Couldn’t be bothered, I was too tired” Jamie laughed as she shuffled down a little more into the sofa.

Dani just giggled then placed herself between Jamie’s legs and put them over her shoulders. “Are you comfy, baby?” Dani asked as she tried to get comfy herself.

Jamie just hummed in response and placed a hand in Dani’s hair and squeezed gently.

“Just relax baby and let me make you feel good” Dani whispered before her mouth got to work on relieving her wife’s built-up tension.


	9. Baggy Clothes, Too Much Googling and Peptalks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Probably the final pregnancy chapter so I hope you like it. Baby will probably make their appearance in the next chapter so I’m looking forward to writing that!! Again, if you guys have any ideas please let me know, I love hearing them! :)
> 
> Thanks to Jamie_e for the prompts for this chapter!!

For the past couple of weeks, Dani had started to notice some changes in Jamie’s behaviour, and she couldn’t exactly put her finger on the cause. 

Once Jamie’s night shirts had started to become too tight with her every growing bump, Jamie had started to wear Dani’s night shirts instead as they were longer and baggier and once they had become too tight as well, Jamie had given up all together and would often just sleep topless. Her bump was growing larger by the day and she thought it was pointless to keep buying new shirts just to sleep in. 

However, over the past week, Jamie had bought some larger shirts to wear for bed. Dani had groaned when Jamie had crawled under the covers the first night that she had put one on as her hands were met with cotton instead of Jamie’s smooth warm skin. Dani had asked why Jamie was wearing it and Jamie had just said that she was a little cold in bed some nights which Dani understood as it was now winter but they had a thick duvet and plenty of blankets on the bed so Jamie shouldn’t have been cold, but Dani didn’t question it any further.

However, Dani did start to notice that the extra baggy t-shirts had also turned into extra baggy shorts and joggers and that Jamie would often ask Dani to leave them on, especially the shirts when they would have sex. The first few times Dani hadn’t given it too much thought as Jamie had told her that she was cold which in fairness, the room had been a little cold, but Dani quickly warmed up when Jamie’s hands were roaming her body. But eventually, Dani suspected that there was more to Jamie’s actions than she was letting on.

That night, like many other nights, Jamie initiated the nights activities. Jamie’s hands trailed under Dani’s night shirt as they laid on the sofa together watching TV. Her fingers started an absentminded trail over Dani’s stomach but then soon wondered higher and higher until Dani placed her hand on top of Jamie’s just before they reached her breasts. 

“Do you want something, baby?” Dani giggled as she stilled Jamie’s movements.

“Maybe” Jamie chuckled as she leant forwards and kissed along Dani’s jaw then down her neck, stopping on her pulse point to nibble and lick.

Dani’s grip on Jamie’s hand loosened as she focused on Jamie’s lips on her neck which allowed Jamie’s hand to continue its journey north to find Dani’s breasts.

Dani let out a few soft moans as Jamie’s hand caressed one of her breast and her teeth bit lightly on her neck.

“I, erm, do you wanna take this upstairs?” Dani asked as she tried to regain control over her slightly erratic breathing.

Jamie just nodded and moved her lips away from Dani’s neck to allow Dani to stand up and help her up off the couch as the simple task had gotten increasingly harder as the months had passed.

Dani’s clothes were discarded on the floor the second that they had reached their bedroom and she backed Jamie towards the bed as she peppered soft kisses along her neck.

When Jamie’s legs touched the edge of the bed, Dani pulled away to let Jamie get comfy on the bed. Dani then got on the bed too and laid down beside Jamie so that she was facing her.

“You comfy?” Dani asked as she shimmied forward a little so that she could kiss Jamie’s lips.

Jamie just nodded and let Dani connect their lips lovingly.

“You’re so beautiful” Dani whispered as she ran her hand up to rest on Jamie’s cheek and let her thumb caress the smooth skin underneath it.

Jamie just connected their lips and deepened the kiss which Dani pulled away from a few seconds later.

“The fairy lights” Dani whispered as she began to roll over to switch them on. Dani loved the fairy lights that she had hung in their bedroom and she liked to turn them on whenever they had sex to make it feel a little more romantic plus, it also allowed her to see more of Jamie without having the harsh bright main light on at night. 

Jamie’s hand landed on Dani’s wrist to stop her movements and she said, “No, it’s fine, leave them, it doesn’t matter”.

Dani narrowed her eyes a little at Jamie but rolled back towards her anyway and reconnected their lips. Sometimes if they were desperate for a release, Jamie would tell her that the lights and candles didn’t matter so Dani just put it down to that, that Jamie was just desperate for her to touch her.

Dani slid her hands up and under Jamie’s t-shirt and trailed her hands up and down her side as their tongues began fighting for dominance.

“Can I take this off?” Dani whispered as she pulled away from the kiss to catch her breath a little.

There was a moment of silence before Jamie whispered, “I’m a little cold”.

Suddenly Dani’s mind seemed to piece everything together. Jamie wearing baggy clothes to bed instead of nothing, her not wanting Dani to take her clothes off when they had sex and Jamie telling Dani the lights didn’t need to be on.

“Hey” Dani said seriously, her hand stopping its movements but stayed resting on Jamie’s waist, “What’s the matter, baby?”.

Jamie didn’t say anything, she just tried to kiss Dani again, but Dani pulled away.

“You can talk to me, you know that don’t you Jamie?” Dani asked as her hand made its way up to caress Jamie’s cheek.

Jamie just nodded slowly but averted her gaze away from Dani’s.

“Hey, look at me” Dani said softly to which Jamie obeyed and connected their gaze again.

“You’re beautiful, Jamie, so beautiful” Dani said sincerely as her eyes tried to communicate the same message. 

Just hearing Dani’s simple words caused Jamie to break. A few tears ran down her face before many many more followed and her body started to shake.

Dani wrapped both her arms around Jamie the best she could considering how they were laying. 

“Oh, sweetheart” Dani whispered as she held Jamie close to her as she cried. She could feel her tears wet her chest as Jamie shook in her arms. “You’re so beautiful, baby, so so so beautiful” Dani whispered as she kissed the top of Jamie’s head. “Is that why you’ve not been letting me take your shirt off or put the lights on, you don’t feel beautiful?”.

Jamie just nodded as she held Dani tightly.

“Oh, baby” Dani whispered as a few tears of her own fell down her face. Her heart broke to know that Jamie had been feeling this way for a while and that she hadn't been able to figure it out sooner. Jamie was the most beautiful person in the world in Dani’s eyes and she couldn’t comprehend Jamie not feeling that way about herself too. “You’re stunning Jamie, you really are”.

“I just feel so… big and gross and, ugh” Jamie said quietly into Dani’s chest, “I just thought that maybe if I tried to cover up a bit, you’d still want to, y’know, have sex with me. I don’t exactly look or feel very attractive right now”.

“Jamie” Dani whispered as she gently pulled Jamie back to look at her in the eyes, “You’re none of those things, okay? You’re beautiful, so beautiful. You’re the most beautiful person in the whole world and I know it’s hard when your body changes so fast, I felt the same way too sometimes when I was pregnant but it’s just not true, baby. You’re carrying our daughter, Jamie, that’s incredible and so so so beautiful. You’re doing an amazing job and I hope you know that”.

“I do” Jamie whispered softly as more and more tears fell from her eyes at Dani’s words.

“And Jamie, I always want to have sex with you” Dani giggled, “I don’t care what you look like, you’ll always be beautiful and incredibly sexy to me, okay? Even when we’re like 90 and covered in wrinkles, I’ll still think that you are the most stunning person on the planet and if we are still able to, I’ll still want to have sex with you because you’re my Jamie okay, and I love you. I love you and adore you and that will never change, never”.

Jamie laughed and her tears started to slow down a little, “You’ll still have sex with me when we’re 90?”.

“Of course, as long as I still can, I will. But no promises, okay, arthritis runs in my family” Dani chuckled before she leant forward to connect their lips.

“So, you don’t mind then that I look like a whale, you still think I'm hot?” Jamie chuckled as she pulled away from Dani’s lips.

“I can’t tell if you’re joking or not” Dani whispered as she eyes scanned over Jamie’s face in search of her meaning behind the comment, “But you don’t look like a whale baby, you look like you’re carrying our child and that’s beautiful. You are so beautiful, sweetheart and there’s no need to cover up okay? You’re sexy and you’re gorgeous and I want to have sex with you, I want to see you, okay? As long as you’re comfortable with that”.

Jamie just nodded and smiled softly, “You’re so incredible, do you know that? I love you so much”.

“I love you too, baby” Dani whispered before she connected their lips again, “So much”.

Jamie deepened the kiss again as Dani’s hands bunched Jamie’s night shirt up.

“Can I?” Dani asked softly against Jamie’s lips to which Jamie just nodded.

Jamie’s night shirt was soon discarded on the floor beside them as Dani’s lips travelled along Jamie’s body.

“Let me show you just how beautiful you are, okay?” Dani whispered as her lips began to kiss every inch of Jamie’s skin that they could find.

____

Every now and then Dani would ask Jamie a seemingly random question. They were usually centred around her health or wellbeing and Jamie didn’t think too much of it as she thought that Dani was just checking to see that she was okay. However, the questions became a lot more frequent and Jamie was starting to get a little suspicious.

“Whatcha doing?” Jamie asked as she sat next to Dani on the sofa one afternoon.

Jamie had just recently gone ‘part-time’ at the flower shop, although she seemed to be doing far more hours than Dani would like her to. She knew Jamie would want to still work up until the baby arrived, but Jamie was getting more and more tired with each passing day, so Dani had convinced her to stay at home that day and have a well-deserved rest.

However, Jamie didn’t do rest, although she had been trying. The day had been long, and it was only 2pm and Jamie was bored out of her mind, so she had decided to go and bother Dani as Mason was busy playing with his trains and didn’t want her help.

“Nothing” Dani said in a voice that was a little too high-pitched, even for Dani. Dani quickly minimised the tab she had open and shut her laptop to turn and look at Jamie.

Jamie just gave her a suspicious look but laid her head on Dani’s shoulder anyway.

“How are you doing?” Dani asked as she kissed Jamie’s temple lightly and reached for her hand.

“Bored” Jamie stated simply as she brought Dani’s hand up to kiss the back of it.

“It’s called having a rest, baby” Dani said softly as she squeezed Jamie’s hand. “I don’t want you working too hard, it’s not good for this one” Dani said as she rested her hand on Jamie’s stomach and instantly felt a kick.

They both laughed softly at the feeling and Jamie but her hand on top of Dani’s. 

“She always kicks when you put your hand there” Jamie laughed, “She clearly already has a favourite, she never kicks when I put my hand there”.

“She gets your attention all the time, baby” Dani giggled softly as she continued to feel their baby kick, “Maybe it’s just exciting to feel someone new”.

“Maybe” Jamie chuckled, “But I still reckon you’re the favourite. She even does it in the night y’know, when ya turn over and put ya arm around me she always kicks”.

“Really?” Dani said smiling brightly, “You’ve never told me that before, why don’t you wake me up?”.

“Thought you’d might like the sleep since we won't be getting any for the next few months” Jamie laughed as she interlocked her and Dani’s fingers together.

“I’d like to feel her kick though, in the night, I think it’s cute” Dani said softly.

“I don’t, she wakes me up with a lovely kick to the ribs” Jamie chuckled, “But next time she does it, I’ll wake ya too”.

“I’d like that” Dani whispered as she kissed Jamie’s temple, “How often does she kick? In a day I mean?”.

“Dunno, depends I think on what’s going on. If ya hands on my bump then it’s a lot more” Jamie chuckled, “Why’d ya ask?”.

“No reason” Dani said as she continued to stroke her thumb over Jamie’s bump.

“Dani” Jamie said seriously as she sat up a little so that she could look Dani in the eyes, “Why’d ya keep asking me weird questions?”.

“I don’t ask you weird questions” Dani said, giggling nervously.

“Dani, seriously, what’s wrong, baby?” Jamie said as she gave her wife a serious look.

Dani sighed softly before she said, “I’m just worried, about you, about our baby. I just want to know your both doing okay”.

Jamie smiled lovingly at Dani, “We’re fine, okay. We’ve been to the doctors; we’ve been told everything is looking fine so that’s good right? Please don’t tell me you’ve been googling stuff that could go wrong?”

Dani went silent as she looked down at her hands.

“Dani” Jamie whispered as she knew instantly that Dani had been doing just that, “Baby, why?”.

“I’m just scared” Dani said softly as her voice broke a little.

“I know, me too, baby. Me too” Jamie said as she wrapped her arm around Dani and pulled her in closer, “But it’s going to be okay. You’ve been through it, so you know what to expect and you know just how good the doctors are, we’ve just got to trust them, haven’t we?”.

Dani just sniffed and nodded.

“I felt the same way when you had Mason, I was so worried for you both but at least we know what to expect now don’t we? We were so oblivious the first time around” Jamie said chuckling a little as she remembered staring wide-eyed at Dani as they looked down at their newborn baby in utter shock.

“Yeah, we do” Dani giggled, “I’m sorry, I'm just nervous and I want everything to go well”.

“No need to be sorry, baby, I understand. But please stop googling, I once googled my cold symptoms and it told me that I was dying so maybe we should just stick to asking the doctors, okay?” Jamie said as she kissed Dani’s temple.

“Okay” Dani giggled as she wrapped her arms around Jamie, “How are you so calm?”.

“I am but I’m not. Some days I'm terrified but I’ve seen you do it, so I know that I’ll be able to do it too” Jamie said softly, and she squeezed Dani tightly.

“I just hope your labour isn’t as long as mine was”.

“Yeah, me too. And if it is, I just hope I've got that many drugs in me that I don’t feel or remember a thing” Jamie joked as she lowered her head to catch Dani’s lips.

“I’ll be right there with you, okay?” Dani whispered, “I promise”.

“I know you will, baby” Jamie whispered as she kissed Dani’s lips again.

____

“So, how long left now?” Hannah asked before she took a sip of her tea.

Hannah and Owen had been calling Dani and Jamie almost every day as it got closer and closer to Jamie’s due date. 

Owen and Hannah had very kindly offered to look after Mason while Jamie and Dani were at the hospital and had been self-isolating for almost 2 weeks now in preparation. It had helped that the country had gone back into lockdown in January so neither of them were allowed to go out to work at Owen’s restaurant or go out anywhere really, but they had stopped going to the supermarket and opted to have their shopping delivered to them instead.

Mason hadn't seen Owen and Hannah in person since October, so he was pretty excited about the idea of a sleep over at their house at some point. He was also pretty excited about the new addition to the family so for him it was a win win. Dani and Jamie were just a little sad that he wouldn’t be able to visit them in the hospital and see his sister straightaway but hopefully Jamie wouldn’t have to stay at the hospital long before she could go home.

“A week or so. Basically, whenever she’s ready now” Jamie chuckled as she sat on the sofa with the laptop on the coffee table. “Hopefully it’s soon because she’s getting too heavy to carry around like this. I can't wait until she’s outta here and in a pram” Jamie said as she rubbed her bump lovingly.

“Are you excited?” Owen asked as he went to put his foot on the coffee table but stopped as he realised Hannah was sat next to him and that this wasn’t one of his and Jamie’s usual afternoon chats.

“Yeah, I am actually. I didn’t think I would be but I am. I just want to meet her now, I don’t care about all that giving birth stuff anymore. I mean obviously it's on my mind but that used to be the end goal for me, giving birth but now it’s not. The end goal is getting to meet her so the whole pushing a thing the size of a watermelon out of me seems a little less scary if I think about holding her for the first time” Jamie said, chuckling a little at her last comment.

Owen just laughed as he and Jamie had gone more into depth about the whole pushing a watermelon out comment in their previous chats.

“Have you got everything ready? What about the nursery?” Hannah asked as she continued drinking her tea, deciding to ignore Jamie and Owen’s laughter at the watermelon comment.

“Yeah, nursery is finished, and all the furniture has been built. Hospital bag is ready and waiting in the corner of our bedroom, Mason’s overnight bag is ready and waiting in his room and you’ve got a spare key to our house just in case ya need it. Everything is ready and waiting for go time” Jamie said smiling brightly as she remembered just how prepared they really were, and it made her feel a little more relaxed knowing that everything was in order.

“Well then, looks like we are just waiting on baby then” Hannah chuckled as she placed her hand on Owen’s knee.

“Ring us if you need anything and I mean anything” Owen said seriously which didn’t happen very often as he and Jamie were constantly joking with each other.

“We will, don’t worry. Expect a call at 3am when my waters break, and you’ve got to come and pick Mason up” Jamie laughed as she rubbed her stomach.

“Whatever time you call, Jamie, we’ll be there” Hannah said reassuringly.

“You know she’s been sleeping with her phone in her hand these past few nights?” Owen said chuckling.

“Really?” Jamie said laughing but feeling a little relived at the same time, “You really don’t have to do that Hannah”.

“It makes me feel better, more prepared” she said softly with a small smile on her face.

“Me too actually” Jamie said quietly.

A few seconds of silence passed before Jamie said, “Thanks for this guys, I know I’ve said it loads but I really do mean it. You’ve both been a great support to us, and I really don’t know how we will ever pay ya back”.

“Just bring home a beautiful baby, okay? That’s all we ask, and we’ll come and visit her though the window whenever you’ll let us. Just focus on you and her okay, that’s all we want in return” Hannah said softly as she lent closer to the laptop camera to get her point across.

“I will try my best” Jamie said smiling softly, “And you are more than welcome to visit her through the window anytime ya want, that’s the least we can do for ya”.

“Well, then” Jamie said after another few seconds of silence, “Best be getting off, got a baby who wants to eat so, I’ll see you guys tomorrow maybe?”.

“Will do” Owen said smiling.

“Thanks for the peptalk guys, I feel a little better knowing Hannah is sleeping by the phone” Jamie said laughing.

“Any time, my dear. Take care of yourself” Hannah said waving and smiling brightly as she ended the call.


	10. The New Arrival

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The baby has finally arrived!! I can't believe we're on chapter 10 already, thank you for all the support and feedback, it really means a lot to me! I really enjoyed writing this chapter so I hope you all like it! If anyone has any ideas for future chapter, please let me know as always! I'm so ready to write all the fluffy cute damie baby cuteness that I can! 
> 
> Thanks to anafrndz37 & Jamie_e for the ideas for this chapter!! :)

“Fuck” Jamie whispered as she lowered herself gently onto the sofa then took a slow deep breath. “Dani will be home soon” she said to herself calmly as she rubbed circles over her bump with her hand that wasn’t holding her up on the sofa, “Just hang in there, little one, just hang in there. Mummy will be home soon”.

Dani had not left Jamie’s side in over two weeks. Wherever Jamie went, Dani went. Although they were in the same house together and none of them had left to go anywhere, Dani still followed Jamie around like an overbearing Mother, always two steps behind her. Jamie didn’t mind it though, she knew that Dani just wanted to be there for her if anything happened, although it would have been nice to go to the toilet alone without Dani hovering outside the door.

They usually took Mason to the park at least twice a week but for the past two weeks, none of them had stepped foot outside of their house. Their baby was due any day now, so Dani had not wanted to leave Jamie alone for any amount of time, let alone go for a trip to the park. However, that day Mason had too much energy and was running around the house at breakneck speed and Dani and Jamie were both worried that it would end in tears. Dani had played with him in the back garden, but the small patch of grass and a swing set just wasn’t sufficient to burn off the majority of his energy.

Dani had then made the decision to reluctantly take him to the park for 20 minutes. Because it was Jamie’s due date too, Dani had asked her at least a hundred times that morning if she was feeling okay and if there were any signs of movement. Dani had asked another hundred times before she had very reluctantly made her way out of the front door and down the road to the park with Mason in tow.

Jamie knew that Mason just needed to let off some steam and she was more than happy for Dani to take him to the local park, although she had lied about not feeling anything. About an hour before the park idea was suggested, Jamie had felt a few twinges but nothing major. She knew that if she had said anything to Dani, Mason would never get to release some of his infinite amount of energy so, she had lied and told Dani that she was fine. She knew Dani wouldn’t be long, 30 minutes at the most and it was very unlikely that she would go into labour during the short amount of time that Dani would be gone. 

However, 10 minutes after Dani had left, Jamie’s waters had broken. 

“Typical, isn’t it?” Jamie said to herself as she tried to implement the breathing techniques the midwife had told her to do once she went into labour.

Jamie wasn’t sure if she should ring Dani or not, she didn’t want to worry her or interrupt Mason’s one trip out of the house in two weeks so, she sat back on the sofa and hoped that Dani would stick to her promise of ‘I’ll be back in 20 minutes, baby’.

Just as she had promised, Dani and Mason were back 20 minutes after they had left and as soon as Dani entered the living room, she knew something was wrong.

“Jamie?” Dani asked, panic clearly evident in her voice as she watched Jamie try her best to breath through a contraction. 

“My waters broke” Jamie said, chuckling a little as she said it but then once she opened her eyes to see Dani stood in front of her, she burst out crying.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, baby. I'm here now, I’m here” Dani said, suddenly putting the panic behind her and going into full-blown teacher mode. If there was any sort of problem, Dani would always go into teacher mode. It was probably her many years of experience dealing with the numerous situations that could arise when looking after a class full of 30 children and honestly it came in quite useful. If Mason hurt himself or did something wrong, Jamie’s first instinct was to panic, but Dani’s was to always remain calm and deal with whatever was in front of her and Jamie couldn’t be more grateful for that.

“Fuck, I’m so scared” Jamie said as she held onto Dani tightly, “And you weren’t here and I didn’t want to worry you but, Fuck, Dani, I’m so scared”.

“I know sweetheart, I know. I knew I shouldn’t have left, it’s typical isn’t it? But I'm here now, okay? You’re going to be fine” Dani said soothingly as she held on to Jamie just as tightly as she was holding onto her.

“Mummy?” Mason said softly as he came out of the kitchen and into the living room with a glass of water in his hands to see Dani holding a teary-eyed Jamie.

“I’m okay” Jamie whispered as she tried to compose herself, “Your baby sister just wants to come and see you is all”.

Mason hesitantly walked over to Dani and Jamie. They had explained to him multiple times what would happen when Jamie went into labour, but it was very different seeing it in real life. Mason hated seeing anyone in pain, especially Jamie who was always the one to look after him if he wasn’t well, so he just walked over to her and gave her a small hug, not really knowing how he could be of any help or comfort.

“It’s okay” he said softly, as he tried to hold back his tears.

“It will be, yeah” Jamie said smiling softly as she placed her hand softly on Mason’s cheek. Jamie still couldn’t get over how emotionally intelligent her son was, and she was extremely proud of him for it. He could always sense when someone was down or in need of a hug and he was always willing to help someone in need, even if he didn’t know them. 

Mason smiled softly in return and Jamie could see the worry in his eyes start to fade a little. 

However, the worry appeared 10 times over as Jamie gritted her teeth and groaned through a contraction which caused Mason to start crying.

“Fuck sake” Jamie groaned as she heard Mason’s cries and squeezed Dani’s hand to help her through the pain. The last thing Jamie wanted to do was upset Mason or cause him any worry, but she knew they had prepared him well for what was going to happen when his baby sister arrived however, she still hated to see him cry. 

“It’s okay, it’s okay, baby. Mummy’s okay, this is totally normal. Remember, we’ve talked about this, Mummy will be in some pain but that’s okay, she’ll be okay. There’s no need to be worried, sweetheart” Dani said softly as she pulled Mason into her so that she could give him a reassuring hug. “Can you do us a big favour? Can you ring Hannah and Owen and tell them your sisters on her way?” Dani asked as she wiped the tears off of Mason’s cheeks and kissed his forehead.

He sniffed a few times then nodded as he picked up Dani’s mobile from the side table.

“Are you okay, baby?” Dani asked as she turned her attention back to Jamie who now had her eyes closed and was breathing deeply.

“Yeah” Jamie said softly as she gave Dani a small smile, “Guess it’s go time, then”.

“Guess it is” Dani giggled as she rubbed calming circles into Jamie’s thighs, “I’ll go and get the bags then”.

Jamie nodded as Dani placed a soft kiss on to her forehead before she ran upstairs to get everything that they needed.

“You be a good boy for Hannah and Owen okay?” Jaime said as she pulled Mason into her side and kissed him on the cheek.

“Will you be okay?” Mason said as he wiped the tears that were falling from his eyes.

“I’ll be fine, don’t worry about me” Jamie said smiling widely to try and ease Mason’s mind a little.

“I made you this” Mason said as he handed Jamie a folded-up piece of paper which she happily took from him, “It might help you feel better”.

“Mason” Jamie said, trying hard to hold in her tears. “It’s beautiful, sweetheart. I love it so much, thank you. It has made me feel so much better already, sweetheart” Jamie said as she looked down at the picture Mason had drew of him, Dani, Jamie and his baby sister.

“I love you” Mason whispered as a few tears escaped his eyes one more.

“I love you too, kiddo. Mommy will call you when she can okay? Just go and enjoy your sleep over but don’t eat too many sweets, they aren’t good for you. And don’t worry about me okay, I’ll be fine. I love you so much, okay?” Jamie said as she placed another kiss on Mason’s cheek before Dani walked him to the door to meet Hannah and Owen.

“Fuck, Dani I don’t think I can do this” Jamie whispered as Dani knelt down in front of her after Mason had gone. Jamie had held herself together the best she could when Mason was in the room but now that he was gone, she couldn’t hold her fears back any longer.

“You can, baby, I know you can. I’ll be right here with you, okay? I’ll hold your hand all the way through it, just like you did for me. I’ll be right next to you the whole time, so there’s nothing to be scared off” Dani said calmly as she held on tightly to Jamie’s hands.

“Okay” Jamie said smiling softly, “I’ve got this”.

“You’d got this, baby. You’re going to be amazing, I know you are” Dani said smiling widely as she watched some of the fear disappear from Jamie’s wide eyes.

____

“I’m so proud of you, baby” Dani whispered as she softly moved a fluffy curl off of Jamie’s slightly damp forehead, “You did so well, baby, so well. I’m so proud of you”.

It had been a long and painful night for both Jamie and Dani. Jamie had been in labour for 12 hours and Dani had to sit by and just hold her hand as she watched the love of her life go through the most pain that she will probably ever feel. 

Dani had kept her promise to Jamie and sat beside her through it all. She did everything that she possibly could to soothe her wife and help her through the process and Jamie was grateful for every second of it. She didn’t think that she would have been able to do it if Dani wasn’t there, holding her hand all the way through it. She had heard stories from the other Mums in the baby group that Dani had signed them up for, about their partners not being allowed in the hospital with them while they were in labour, but thankfully their hospital had assured them that Dani could be there for Jamie throughout the labour if she wanted to be.

In the early hours of the next morning, their beautiful healthy baby girl was born. As soon as her high-pitched cries filled the room, both Dani and Jamie had let out a huge sigh of relief that they had felt like they had been holding for 9 months. They both had let out another one when their daughter was placed on Jamie’s chest and they got to see her for the first time. As soon as her little body was placed onto Jamie’s chest, Jamie couldn’t help but cry. All her life she had thought having children and getting married would be impossible. At first, she wasn’t even sure if she even wanted children at all, but there she was, holding her daughter for the first time with her wife sat beside her squeezing her arm and their son safely at home. It was more than she could have ever imaged her life becoming.

“She’s so beautiful” Dani whispered as she kissed Jamie’s lips.

“She really is” Jamie said, smiling down at the little bundle of joy in her arms as tears rolled down her face.

Dani had gotten to cut the umbilical cord just as Jamie had done seven years ago in the expect same hospital. She then had gotten to hold their daughter for the first time who happily laid on her chest whilst the doctors sorted Jamie out. They had then been moved onto a ward where Dani had texted Hannah to tell her that everything had gone smoothly and to ask how Mason was doing.

“I’m so proud of you” Dani repeated as she squeezed Jamie’s shoulder lightly.

“I can't believe I actually did it” Jamie whispered as she looked down at their daughter in her arms as she rested her head on Dani’s shoulder.

They were both sat in Jamie’s hospital bed, staring in wonder at the life that they had brought into the world together. 

“You did so well, baby. I’m so proud of you both” Dani whispered as she kissed the top of Jamie’s head.

“I don’t ever wanna let her go” Jamie said chuckling a little as she ran her thumb over their daughter’s cheek.

“She looks just like you” Dani said softly as she fixed the bright pink hat on top of their daughter’s head.

“Ya think so?” Jamie asked as she looked down at the peacefully sleeping baby in her arms, trying to find how they might look alike.

“Do the dark green eyes and soft curly brown hair not give it away?” Dani giggled as she kissed Jamie’s cheek lovingly.

“I suppose, now you mention it” Jamie chuckled as she smiled brightly up at Dani. “I love you so much” Jamie said softly as she kissed Dani’s lips lovingly.

“I love you too, baby. I can't believe we have another child” Dani giggled as she nuzzled her nose with Jamie’s.

“I know, I can't believe it either. Mason’s going to make a wonderful big brother, isn’t he?” Jamie said as her eyes focused on the baby in her arms again.

“Yeah, he’ll be great, I just know it” Dani whispered as she ran her thumb along her daughter’s soft rosy cheek.

“Hey buddy” Jamie said as cheerfully as her body would let her as she saw Mason walk into the living room nervously. He had his hands by his sides in small fists, just the same way that Dani does when she’s nervous. “It’s okay” Jamie said smiling brightly, trying to hide her pain and discomfort as she sat on the sofa with their daughter fast asleep in the baby carrier on the coffee table in front of her.

Jamie had been let out of the hospital that evening. Everything had gone well and her and their daughter were healthy enough to go home. Hannah and Owen had dropped Mason off half an hour after Dani, Jamie and their new arrival had arrived back home. 

“Are you okay?” Mason asked quietly as he tentatively approached Jamie. They had explained to him that Jamie would be sore and in some pain after she had given birth so they all had to be gentle with her until she was feeling better. Mason hadn't needed the prior warning though to know that Jamie was in pain and that he needed to be careful with her, he could tell just by looking at her face. Her skin was pale, her lips were dry, and she was sat awkwardly on the sofa as she smiled at him, trying to reassure him that she was fine.

“I’m fine, sweetheart. I’m just a little sore is all, nothing to worry about” Jamie said softly as she smiled widely at Mason who was a spitting image of Dani when she didn’t know what to do in a situation.

“Can I give you a hug?” Mason asked tentatively as he stood near Jamie, not knowing exactly what he should do, but knowing that he wanted to comfort her in any way that he could.

“Of course you can, sweetheart” Jamie said chuckling a little as she opened her arms which Mason gladly fell into.

The hug was gentle and tentative on Mason’s part, but he soon relaxed into Jamie as she held him tight and kissed his cheek. The hug was quickly interrupted when the baby, who he had yet to meet, made a little noise. Mason pulled away from Jamie and turned to look in the direction of the baby carrier.

“She’s saying hello to you” Jamie chuckled as she saw Mason’s eyes widen in part panic and part excitement.

“Hello” Mason said quietly as he studied his new baby sister for the first time.

Dani then walked into the room with a huge bag full of tupperware dishes. 

“What’s all that?” Jamie asked as she narrowed her eyes to try and make out the contents.

“Apparently Owen and Mason spent all yesterday and today cooking for us, so we don’t have to for what looks like at least a month” Dani said giggling as she placed the bag on the kitchen table, washed her hands then walked over to Jamie and Mason on the sofa.

“Do you want to hold her?” Jamie asked as she watched Mason eye up the baby who was now cooing and moving her arms around a little.

Mason nodded nervously but Jamie’s bright smile helped to calm his nerves.

Dani gently picked up their daughter and gave her to Mason, making sure her arms were supporting his as he held her.

“What’s her name?” Mason asked as he looked down at the baby in his arms with wide eyes as she started to make soft noises.

“Blake” Jamie said softly as she reached for her phone to take a picture of the three most important people in her world.

“Blake” Mason whispered, almost like he was trying out the name to see how it fitted with the baby in his arms.

“Hi, Blake” Mason said softly, “I’m Mason, your big brother. You look different to your picture next to my bed”.

Dani and Jamie both let out a soft chuckle at the comment. Mason had asked if he could have their scan photo in his room to go with the other pictures that he had of him, Dani and Jamie. They had happily agreed and placed the scan photo in a frame on his nightstand. The had both seen him looking at the picture intently on a variety of different occasions, almost like he was trying to picture the image as an actual real-life baby.

Blake then reached out a tiny hand and grabbed a fist full of Mason’s t-shirt which caused everyone to laugh.

“Do you think she likes me?” Mason asked as he looked up at Jamie.

“I know she likes you, kiddo” Jamie said as she ruffled Mason’s hair.

“You’re going to be the best big brother in the whole wide world” Dani said as she kissed Mason’s cheek, “She’s so lucky to have you”.

___

“I can't believe it” Jamie said as she intently watched their daughter in the Moses basket next to their bed, “She’s so perfect”. Jamie had hardly taken her eyes off their daughter since she was born and every time she couldn’t see her, she felt like a huge piece of her was missing that she needed to get back as quickly as possible. She had felt the same way with Mason when he was a baby but only this time it was stronger and she finally understood what Dani had been talking about all those years ago after she had just had Mason. 

“She is, isn’t she” Dani said as she kissed Jamie’s neck and tightened her arms around her. “I’m so proud of you, I know I’ve said it like a million times today but I really am. You did amazing” Dani whispered as she too focused on their daughter peacefully asleep beside their bed.

“Thanks, I’m proud of me too. Never thought I’d ever get the chance to have a baby y’know but now I’ve got two” Jamie said chuckling a little as she reached for Dani’s hand, “And an amazing wife who I don’t think I could ever love more if I tried”.

“Who would have known that when we first met all those years ago, that this would be our life?” Dani whispered as she nuzzled her face into Jamie’s neck which smelt like her flowery shampoo.

“I know. I mean I wanted all these things with you, but I didn’t actually think they would happen” Jamie chuckled as she squeezed Dani’s hand.

“I’m so glad they did though, I wouldn’t change our life for anything. We got so lucky” Dani said before she placed a loving kiss on Jamie’s cheek.

“Just remind yourself of that when we’re running on 2 hours of sleep a night” Jamie said, laughing a little louder than she had intended to, but luckily the sound didn’t disturb their peacefully sleeping daughter.

“I will” Dani giggled, “I love you so much”.

“Were you saying that when I was screaming and cutting the blood supply off in your hand last night?” Jamie said chuckling softly as she tried to remember her labour.

“I was actually. I even said it to you when you told me that you wanted to kill the nurse who kept telling you to push even when you said that you didn’t have the energy to anymore” Dani said giggling.

“Shit, did I really say that?” Jamie said, having no recollection of that ever happening.

“You did, but you apologised to her after when she handed you Blake. She told you not to worry about it, it wasn’t even in the top 100 worse things that have been said to her during a labour” Dani said as she nuzzled her face into Jamie’s neck again.

“Fuck, I’m so embarrassed. I'm going to have to send her a card or something” Jamie said as her cheeks flushed a little at the thought of her saying that to someone who was trying to help her. But in her defence, she was in a lot of pain.

“We will” Dani giggled, “Now, get some sleep, you’ve had a long couple of days, baby”.

Just as Dani and Jamie snuggled further down under the covers to get comfy and they closed their eyes, high-pitched cries came from beside them.

Both of them laughed as they sat up and tended to their daughter.


	11. Breastfeeding Troubles, Flower Shop Visits and Afternoon Naps

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the late update, uni is getting crazy busy, but I hope you enjoy this chapter!! as always, any ideas you want to see, just let me know!! :)
> 
> thanks to anafrndz37 for the ideas!! :)

“Are you sure I’m doing this right?” Jamie asked through gritted teeth as she watched Blake laid in her arms happily suckling away with closed eyes.

“You’re doing it perfectly” Dani said reassuringly as she kissed Jamie’s cheek softly then placed her chin back on Jamie’s shoulder.

Dani was sat on their bed with her back resting against the headboard as Jamie sat between her legs with Blake in her arms whilst she was breastfeeding her. Jamie had been having a hard time breastfeeding Blake ever since she had arrived and even though the nurse at the hospital had told her that she was doing it just fine and that it might hurt for the first few days, Jamie was sure that she was doing something wrong for it to hurt the way that it was. 

“The nurse said that you were doing it perfectly, so don’t worry. It hurt a little for me too at the beginning, but it does get easier, I promise. But we can always bottle feed her if you need to. Or do a combination of both maybe. Whatever works for you, baby” Dani said softly as she lightly rubbed her thumb over Blake’s head and pulled Jamie in closer to her with the arm that was wrapped around her waist.

“I can't be doing it right if it hurts so much” Jamie groaned as she lent her cheek against Dani’s to seek out a little comfort to try and counteract the pain that she was experiencing.

“It’s totally normal, baby” Dani whispered as she kissed Jamie’s cheek again, “Don’t forget, she’s feeding almost every two hours so it’s very likely that it will hurt for a little while. You can always try bottle feeding her and see how that goes?”.

“I know but I wanna give her the best you know, to give her the best start in life” Jamie said as she looked down at Blake lovingly as she watched her eyelids flutter shut and her long eyelashes brush against her rosy cheeks.

“You are giving her the best start in life, baby, just by being her Mum” Dani said as she gave Jamie a reassuring squeeze.

“You know what I mean” Jamie said softly.

“I know, baby. But don’t force yourself to feed her if it hurts you too much, okay? Baby formula is just as good as breastmilk, especially if it stops you from being in pain” Dani whispered as she watched with a wide smile as Blake pulled away, signalling that she was satisfied for the time being.

“I know” Jamie sighed as she picked Blake up and kissed her cheek. “Wanna do the honours?” Jamie asked as she gently wiped Blakes mouth with her bib before handing her to Dani who already had her hands waiting to receive their daughter.

“Of course!” Dani said enthusiastically in her high-pitched baby voice as she took Blake from Jamie and rested her on her chest with her head over her shoulder, “You know how much I love burpie time”.

Jaime watched with a wide smile on her face as Dani lovingly rubbed Blake’s back as she talked to her. Although breastfeeding hurt, Jamie adored feeding time. Every time she did it, she could feel her already strong connection with her daughter growing and she knew that Dani felt the same way. Dani loved feeding time just as much as Jamie and although she couldn’t feed their daughter herself, she loved just being present for the moment and she especially loved getting to burp Blake afterwards as that had become their special bonding time. Dani was always ready and waiting, no matter what she was doing, with a blanket over her shoulder for Blake to finish eating so that she could burp her. 

“So, what are you doing today?” Dani asked as she continued patting Blake’s back softly as Jamie started to get dressed for the day.

“I was thinking of going to the shop, checking to see if it’s still alright. Thought Blake might appreciate the visit too since she’s never been before” Jamie said as she shimmied out of her sleep shorts and into some of Dani’s sweatpants.

“I can go and check it for you if you want? I don’t mind” Dani said as she continued rubbing Blake’s back.

“No, it’s fine, I've not been out since this one came along” Jamie said as she wondered over to Dani and placed a soft kiss to Blake’s head, “Should probably venture out at some point. Plus, the plants at the shop need watering so I might as well go and do it. It’ll save you doing it again. Plus, I've seen you with a watering can, you’re a little haphazard”.

“I’m not haphazard!” Dani said in her high-pitched baby voice as she finished burping Blake and picked her up to pepper her with soft kisses, “Am I Blakie? I just like to give the plants a good drink is all”.

“More like a good bath” Jamie chuckled as she climbed onto the bed next to Dani and laid her head in Dani’s lap, “Pretty sure some of ‘em could swim in the amount of water that you give them”.

“Well, I never said I had a green thumb now did I? I just offered to keep them alive for you while this beautiful girl made her way into the world” Dani said as she nuzzled her nose into Blake’s body and peppered her with a few more soft kisses.

“Let’s hope they’re still alive when we get there then” Jamie chuckled as she placed a few light kisses onto Dani’s thigh as she rested her head on it.

“Mummy?” Mason asked quietly as he appeared in the doorway rubbing his eyes with his fists and holding his beloved blanket in one of his hands.

“You okay, sweetheart?” Jamie asked as she lifted her head up just enough to be able to look at her son.

“Is it morning?” Mason asked as he approached his parents’ bed. 

Blake had been waking Mason up with her cries at all times of the night and he would often wonder into Dani and Jamie’s bedroom to ask what was going on. He wasn’t used to waking up often in the middle of the night so the regular wake up calls were causing quite the confusion for him. Most nights he would fall asleep in Dani and Jamie’s bed after wondering into their room to check on Blake then wake up 3 hours later in his own bed after Dani had carried him back to his room. Dani and Jamie had tried to explain why Blake cried so much during the night and that it was nothing to worry about, but Mason wasn’t convinced. He hated anyone being upset, especially his new baby sister so he would always go to check on her and try to offer her some comfort.

“Sure is, kiddo. It’s pretty early though so you can go back to bed if you want to. School doesn’t start for a few more hours” Jamie said as she watched Mason look around the room a little disorientated as he tried to figure out what time it was.

“Can I stay with you?” Mason asked softly as he looked up at Blake who was drifting off back to sleep after being fed.

“Course you can, come here” Jamie said as she opened her arms up for Mason to crawl into which he did happily, and he wrapped his arms around her as he laid his head gently on her chest.

“Family snuggle time it is then” Dani said giggling softly as she ran her fingers through Mason’s wild hair whilst he closed his eyes and tried to get back to sleep.

“I love you, Mummy” Mason whispered as he brought his blanket up to his cheek.

“Love you too, kiddo” Jamie said softly as she kissed the top of his head and held him tightly.

“How did we get so lucky?” Jamie whispered as she looked up at Dani with loving eyes once Mason and Blake had drifted back off to sleep.

“No idea” Dani whispered as her hand left Mason’s head and rested against Jamie’s cheek as her thumb gently rubbed semi-circles over the soft skin that she found there, “But I wouldn’t change it for the world”.

“Me too” Jamie whispered as she turned her head and placed a gentle kiss onto Dani’s palm. “I never imagined that I’d be able to have a life this good” Jamie said softly as she rubbed Mason’s back soothingly as he slept on her chest, “Always thought that I’d just live alone with me plants, y’know, never let anyone in. But then you came along and ruined that didn’t ya?”.

“Sure did. Sorry about that” Dani said giggling softly as her thumb went back to caressing Jamie’s cheek, “But I think that it all turned out okay, didn’t it?”.

“More than okay” Jamie said softly as her eyes started to become heavy, “Thanks for sticking with me though, I know I’m not the easiest person to love, especially back then”.

“Loving you is the easiest thing that I’ve ever done, baby” Dani whispered as she leant forward and placed a loving kiss to Jamie’s forehead, “Now get some sleep, baby, I’m right here if you need me”.

Jamie then turned her head to the side and placed a soft, sleepy kiss to Dani’s thigh before letting sleep consume her for another hour or so.

____

“Okay, so,” Jamie said as she softly bounced in place as she stood watering the plants in her flower shop window with Blake laid happily in a sling around her torso taking in her new surroundings.

Jamie had taken Blake with her to the flower shop that morning whist Dani stayed at home with Mason to help him with his online schooling. Jamie was relieved that Dani had taken over his studies since she had started her maternity leave 3 weeks ago as she knew that Dani was a far better teacher than she was, hence, why that was her full-time job and Jamie worked in a flower shop. She knew that Mason would likely learn a lot more from Dani teaching him than her and she thought that he also might like the welcome break from her trying to figure out what was going on before she tried to explain it to him.

All morning she had been telling Blake all about the flowers and the plants that she had in the shop and explaining how to take care of each one. She had done the same with Mason when he was little, and he loved plants now so Jamie was hoping that the same would happen with Blake. She could already tell that Blake was interested in what was going on but that was probably because everything was still so new for her. However, Jamie was hoping that her love of plants would rub off on her daughter or at least be passed down genetically.

“This plant right here Blakie, is a monstera deliciosa. They are pretty easy to take care of and they are by far one of our best sellers” Jamie explained as she turned the plant around a little then gave it a drink of water.

Blake just stared wide-eyed with parted lips as Jamie moved a little so that she could show her the plant.

“Looks like your Mommy got a little excited with the watering can the other day” Jamie said chuckling a little as she felt the soil of the plant next to the one that she had just watered, “No problem though is it Blakie? They will soon drink it up”.

Blake just stared up at her with wide eyes as Jamie talked to her then kissed the top of her head softly.

“How do you think Mommy and Mason are getting along today, huh?” Jamie asked as she walked over to the back office with her now empty watering can. 

“I think they’ll be doing just fine too, Blake” Jamie said after a moment of silence as she looked down at Blake, “I bet Mason would rather be here with us though watering these plants instead of being at home learning fractions. Mason loves it here and I bet you will too when you’re a little older and can wonder around and explore everything all on your own”.

Blake just made a few soft noises in response which caused Jamie to chuckle as she remembered the way that she used to work with Mason tied to her front just like Blake was now when Dani had gone back to work after having him.

“Your brother used to sit right here, just like you’re doing now, and it wasn’t long before he was off crawling and walking around like he owned the place” Jamie said laughing softly as she placed her hand on the back of Blake’s head through the material, “Then it wasn’t long after that that he started watering the plants for me and helping out. He’s a great little worker y’know, and he only wants to be paid in chocolate so that’s a bonus”.

Blake just stuck her tongue out and make a few soft noises in the silence that had grown between them as Jamie got lost in thought. Jamie loved when she paused to give Blake a chance to reply and she usually always did in the form of a few coos or soft noises. She didn’t know if it was the fact that she hardly spoke to anyone apart from Dani and Mason and a handful of friends, but Jamie was convinced that Blake could actually communicate to her as it always felt like she was having a proper conversation with her.

“Shall we get you home then, sweetheart, I think we’re done here for today. We can see what Mommy and Mason are doing, can't we? We might even be able to help them with their fractions” Jamie said laughing as she skilfully transferred Blake from the sling and into her pram. “We can walk back through the park if you want to, baby, what do you say? Wanna see the trees and the birds again, huh?” Jamie said as she wrapped a blanket around her daughter and put her hat back on that had fallen off in the transition from the sling to the pram so that she would be warm in the cool air outside.

Blake just waved her arms around a little and make a few soft noises as Jamie peppered her with light kisses.

“Come on then, sweetheart, let’s go home”.

As Jamie had promised she walked home though the park which her and Blake had walked through on their way to the flower shop. The park was quiet with only the odd dog walker in sight. Blake looked up mesmerised by the passing trees and plants as they strolled down the winding paths that led them home. Once they had left the park and were back onto normal streets, Blake slowly started to drift off to sleep with the soothing motion of the pram and the lack of exciting new things to see.

“You’re back” Dani said smiling widely as Jamie and Blake made their way through the front door. “We’ve missed you guys” Dani said as she wrapped her arms tightly around Jamie as she finished hanging her coat on the hook by the door.

“We’ve missed you too” Jamie said chuckling at the unexpected welcome as Dani squeezed her tight and kissed her neck.

“You okay?” Jamie asked as she pulled back from the hug a little to look at Dani in the eyes.

“Yeah” Dani said softly as she smiled widely, “Can I not miss my wife now?”.

“Course you can” Jamie chuckled as lent forward to kiss Dani lovingly.

Dani just hummed into kiss as her eyes fluttered shut. “I really did miss you, baby” Dani whispered against Jamie’s lips as she pulled away.

“Don’t tell me you’ve gotten clingier after not letting me out of your sight for almost 3 weeks” Jamie said laughing softly as she pulled Dani back into a tight hug.

“Maybe” Dani giggled as she buried her face into Jamie’s neck.

“You’re so adorable, do you know that?” Jamie whispered against Dani’s ear in between a few light kisses.

“It’s not my fault that I’ve been by your side for like a month now and that the first time you go out on your own, I miss you like crazy” Dani said giggling softly as she held on tightly to her wife who she hadn't anticipated on missing so much in the 2 hours that she had been away.

“It did feel a little odd not having you a few steps behind me, I have to admit” Jamie chuckled as she swayed softly from side to side with Dani in her arms.

____

Dani made her way down the stairs quickly an hour and a half after disappearing up them to teach a class. Although she was on maternity leave, she had promised her class that she would pop back to see them and teach them a lesson every once in a while. The teacher that had taken over her class wasn’t exactly the funniest teacher in the world and her students were sad that they would no longer have Dani teaching them to make home learning fun and engaging. Dani had felt so sorry for them, even though she knew that they would be in good hands, so had promised them that she would visit them once a month and teach them a class. 

As soon as she had joined the Zoom call she was bombarded with questions from her students about Jamie and their baby so Dani had promised them that if they all behaved well and did their work, that she would show them Blake. So, an hour and a half later with 30 children eagerly waiting on the call for a glimpse of her daughter, Dani made her way downstairs to find Blake.

As Dani poked her head around the living room door, the sight that she was met with made her heart swell a ridiculous amount and it brought a few tears to her eyes. Dani had left Jamie sat at the kitchen table in charge of Mason’s home learning before she had made her way upstairs but now Jamie and Mason were laid on the floor fast asleep next to a board game that they were in the middle of playing. She knew that they were both tired from waking up early that day and having an interrupted sleep schedule ever since Blake had arrived so seeing Mason laid in front of Jamie with his head resting on a cushion with Jamie’s arm wrapped tightly around him made her heart swell. Blake was fast asleep in her Moses basket next to them and by the three pieces on the games board, it looked like she had been playing the game with them too.

Dani couldn’t help but stand in the doorway and stare lovingly at the three most important people in her life. She had always wanted a family of her own ever since she was a little girl and sometimes it hit her at random moments throughout the day that she had a created the perfect family who she loved with everything that she had and who loved her the exact same way. 

Dani wiped a few tears from her eyes then crept towards the basket of blankets next to the sofa and pulled a thick one out and gently laid it over Jamie and Mason so that they wouldn’t get cold. She then knelt down and placed a soft kiss on the top of each of their heads before picking Blake up and taking her upstairs.

“Hey, sweetheart” Dani whispered as she walked out of the living room with Blake in her arms, “Got a few people who can't wait to meet you”.

Blake made a few soft noises before she opened her eyes to look up at Dani.

“’Hey, baby, good morning” Dani whispered as she softly kissed Blake’s cheek. No matter what time of day Blake woke up from a nap, Dani insisted on telling her good morning, even though Jamie said that it might confuse her, and that she’ll end up never knowing what time of day it really is. “Did you have fun playing with Mummy and Mason, huh?” Dani asked as she kissed Blake’s tiny fist.

Blake just yawned and waved her fist around a little in response.

“I bet you won the game, didn’t you? I always knew you’d be a master at ludo” Dani said chuckling softly as she made her way into her bedroom that now doubled as her office to hear exited gasps from her students as Blake came into shot.


	12. First Introductions, Window Chats and Timetables

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A slightly longer chapter for you guys to make up for the later-than-usual update. Uni is getting pretty busy, so I might not be able to update as often as I used to but keep sending me ideas as I love writing this fic so much, it brings me so much joy!! 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy this chapter and thank you to camilacinica & stasiamichelle8 for the ideas!!

The room filled with the sound of tinny gasps of excitement and murmurs coming through the speakers as Dani took a seat in front of her laptop and adjusted the angle of her camera so that her class could see Blake laid in her arms. 

She could tell her class didn’t know exactly what to do as they were all being as quiet as they could in order not to disturb or scare the baby that they were all staring wide-eyed at. Dani didn’t think she’d ever heard her class this quiet in all the time that she had been teaching them.

“So, everyone, this is Blake” Dani said softly with a proud smile on her face as she looked up at her screen and back down at Blake again who was staring up at her with bright eyes. 

“Hello Blake” a few voices said quietly as a few of the children on the screen moved closer to try and get a better look at Blake.

Dani picked up Blake’s clenched fist and waved it in the direction of the camera which caused the children to laugh and giggle and wave back.

“How old is she, Mrs Clayton?” Jake, one of Dani’s students asked which caused a few other students to nod in agreement like they all wanted to know the answer to the question too.

“Blake is, erm… 8 days old today” Dani said, quickly trying to figure out how long it had been since Blake had entered the world. Time was no longer something Dani understood as every day seemed to blend into the other as the lack of sleep began to build up.

“Does she cry all the time, Mrs Clayton?” Daniella, another student asked.

Dani laughed softly as she looked down at Blake who was now in between napping and waking up. Blake looked like she wanted to look what was happening around her, but she also looked like she wanted to go back to sleep as her heavy eyelids kept fluttering shut. “She cries a lot during the night” Dani said giggling as she gently stroked her thumb over Blake’s cheek, “But during the day she doesn’t cry as much, only when she wants something to eat usually”.

Dani had noticed a few of her students Mums had appeared on the screen too as they also wanted to get a quick look at the new arrival.

“How are you doing, Mrs Clayton?” Nick’s Mum asked as she came into view on Dani’s laptop, “It’s good to see you both looking so well”.

“I’m good, thank you for asking” Dani said smiling widely, “And Blakes doing well too”.

“How’s Jamie?” Nicole asked and a few other children nodded in response and said ‘yeah’ like they all had the same question too.

“She’s good, she’s a little tired but she’s doing well, thank you for asking Nicole” Dani replied with a wide smile on her face at the thought of her students being concerned about her wife’s wellbeing.

“Can we see her, is she here?” Luke asked, looking around the screen as if he was looking for her.

“She’s downstairs at the moment, so I'm not sure if she would be able to come and say hello” Dani said as she remembered leaving Jamie and Mason fast asleep on the living room floor. However, Dani could see the disappoint arise on her students faces at her comment. 

Her students had grown quite attached to Jamie over lockdown as they had gotten to see a lot more of her than they would have usually done if they were at school. Jamie had made a few appearances in her lessons over the past year and she had even delivered a few of them here and there about growing plants and vegetables at home. After the first lesson she had taught them, Dani’s students were hooked and constantly asked when Jamie would be back to talk to them again. Jamie was equally as hooked, and the lesson had gone a lot better than she had expected, so she had agreed to do them again if Dani wanted her to. 

The last time Jamie had talked to them was the week before Dani had left for her maternity leave. Dani had thought that it was important to show her students how families came in all different shapes and sizes so had asked Jamie if she would come and talk to her class about their family and soon to be newborn baby. Dani’s class loved the talk and loved the chance to talk to Jamie and ask her questions and Jamie had enjoyed it too and she wished that she would have had a chance to talk to someone like herself when she was younger to show her what her life could be like.

“I can maybe ask her if she wants to say hello?” Dani offered which was met with cheers from her class, “But no promises, okay guys?”

Dani made her way down the stairs with Blake in her arms to find Jamie just carrying a still sleeping Mason to the sofa.

“Hey” Dani whispered after Jamie had laid Mason down on the sofa and wrapped a blanket around him to keep him warm.

Jamie turned around to look in Dani’s direction. “Hey, how was your lesson?” Jamie asked as she crept over to the doorway where Dani was stood.

“Good, they, erm, they asked to see you. You don’t have to if you don’t want to, they just looked so desperate to say hello so I said I would come and ask you” Dani said as she handed Blake to Jamie.

“Really?” Jamie asked, smiling softly as she placed a kiss onto Blake’s cheek.

“Yeah, they’ve already met Blake and now they wanna see if you’re doing okay too” Dani said as she kissed Jamie’s cheek lovingly.

“Well, better go tell my fans I'm fine then, hadn't I?” Jamie said chuckling as she looked down at Blake who was fast asleep in her arms.

“Jamie!” everyone shouted excitedly as Jamie came into shot but then the loud cheers were toned down as they saw a sleeping Blake in her arms.

“Hey guys,” Jamie said in a cheerful voice as she sat down on Dani’s office chair, “heard you were a little concerned about me, wanted to know how I was?”.

All the children on the screen nodded as they stared intently at Jamie waiting for her answer.

“I’m good, thanks for asking, just a little tired is all” Jamie said honestly which is the first time Dani had really heard Jamie say that she was tired in a serious voice. Usually, it was in a joke or an offhanded comment but never meant seriously.

Dani bent down and wrapped her arms around Jamie’s neck as she watched the children on her screen hold up their hands waiting patiently to ask Jamie a question.

____

Mason jumped down from his chair at the kitchen table and ran to the living room window shouting Owen’s name excitedly as Owen’s signature knock rang through the house.

Owen and Hannah had been visiting Dani, Jamie, Mason and Blake at least 3 times a week, if not more since Blake had arrived. Everyone had become very familiar with the routine by now. Owen would knock on the front door and leave a bag full of food and essential items on the doorstep whilst everyone made their way to the front window for a quick chat. Jamie hated the fact that Owen and Hannah couldn’t come in and meet Blake in real life and get to hold her. Owen and Hannah were the closest thing she had to a family before Dani had come along and it hurt her that they couldn’t share this moment with her.

“Owen!” Mason shouted as his legs stopped just in time so that he didn’t collide with the windowsill. 

Mason adored Owen and the feeling was mutual. Pre-pandemic, Mason would see Owen at least once a week and they would go to the park together and play football or Owen would take him to his restaurant and teach him how to cook. No matter what they did together, they would both have a great time and by the end of the day, neither of them wanted to leave the other.

“Have you brought cookies again?” Mason continued as he tried to see if Owen had left a bag on the doorstep.

“Of course I have. Made them especially for you this morning” Owen said, his voice slightly muffled through the windowpane.

“Yes!” Mason shouted jumping up and down, “Thank you, Owen!”.

“You know Owen is more than just a guy who brings you cookies, you know” Dani said laughing as she approached the windowsill and went to open one of the top windows just a little so that they could all hear each other a little clearer.

“Thank you for noticing” Owen replied with a small smirk on his lips.

“How are you doing, darling?” Hannah said seriously. She asked the same question every time that they visited and every time that they spoke over the phone and she always genuinely wanted to know the answer.

“Good, we’re good” Dani said smiling widely as she placed her hands on Mason’s shoulders and gave them a soft squeeze, “Tired though. We’re always tired”.

Hannah smiled softly up at Dani and she could tell from her slightly red eyes that she had probably had no more than about 4 hours of sleep the night before. “Where’s the cause of your lack of sleep, then? Having her own uninterrupted nap, I'm guessing” Hannah asked laughing softly.

“Yeah, she sure is. All she seems to do is cry all night and sleep all day” Dani said laughing, “But you’ve come just in time, she woke up about 15 minutes ago so I think Jamie should be finishing up feeding her any minute now”.

“She knew you were coming” Jamie said chuckling as she made her way into the living room with Blake in her arms after hearing Owen’s signature knock on the front door.

“Oh wow, hasn’t she grown” Hannah remarked as Jamie walked closer to the window.

“Getting bigger every day now aren’t ya?” Jamie said to Blake who was staring and cooing at Hannah who had her hand on the glass as if trying to reach Blake the best that she could.

“She sure is” Owen said, “I reckon it’s all them cookies I keep giving you”.

Jamie and Dani just laughed as they both looked down at Mason, “No one else gets a look in at them cookies, this one eats ‘em all”.

Mason just giggled cheekily as he looked up at his Mums with a wide toothy grin that looked identical to Dani’s.

“And how are you doing, Jamie?” Hannah asked as she pulled funny faces at Blake who was still staring wide-eyed at her through the window, “Everything still okay? How’s breastfeeding, is it still painful?”.

“I’m good” Jamie said smiling softly at Hannah, “And breastfeeding isn’t as bad as it was, it’s getting a lot less painful now so I’m glad I stuck with it. Took a good two weeks though”.

“Oh, that’s good, I'm really glad. Dani said you were in a lot of pain, I just hoped that it would get better for you” Hannah said, taking her eyes off Blake to look up at Jamie for a second.

Jamie smiled softly as she looked at Hannah. Jamie wasn’t a person who went around hugging everyone she met, and she hated physical contact from the majority of people, but she missed Hannah’s hugs that made her feel like she could never do anything wrong. It had been a very long 12 months of only ever seeing each other over Zoom, through a window and at 2 meters distance in the park and there was nothing more Jamie wanted than to just hug Hannah and tell her how grateful she was to have her in her life.

“Wish I could give ya a hug” Jamie said softly once Hannah’s eyes returned to Blake.

“It won't be long now, dear” Hannah said with a reassuring smile on her face, “Then you’ll never get rid of me”.

Jamie laughed a little louder than she had expected to do, and the sound caused Blake to quickly turn her attention away from Hannah and onto Jamie. “At this point I don’t think I’d mind, if I'm being honest” Jamie said with a chuckle.

Dani wrapped her arms around Jamie’s waist from behind as she saw a few tears well up in Jamie’s eyes and placed a loving kiss to her cheek. She knew Jamie was missing Hannah and Owen a lot and she knew how heavily they had relied on them when Mason had been born and it was hard to not have them around now with Blake being just a few weeks old.

“We can't wait for you to babysit these two” Dani said giggling a little as she watched Mason and Owen pulling funny faces at each other through the windowpane. 

“We can't wait either” Owen said as he playfully stuck his tongue out at Mason who did the same back and giggled loudly, “Might never give them back to you”.

“Fine by me” Dani giggled as she tightened her arms around Jamie’s waist, “I can't wait for a good night’s sleep”.

“Fine by me too, as long as you take over online learning for us. I don’t think I can stand trying to understand and teach grammar anymore” Jamie said laughing.

“And you think I’d be any batter?” Owen said winking playfully.

Everyone groaned at Owen’s pun and rolled their eyes.

“I will never forgive you if you teach our son any of those awful puns” Jamie said as she swayed softly in place to soothe Blake in her arms, “He copies everything you do. The day that he’s able to grow a moustache, I'm pretty sure he will”.

“And he’ll look very handsome when he does, Jamie” Owen said was a chuckle as he wiggled his moustache playfully which caused Mason to laugh loudly and everyone else to roll their eyes.

____

Jamie and Dani both groaned when loud high-pitched cries filled their bedroom, waking them up from their deep peaceful sleep.

Ever since Blake was born, Dani and Jamie had fallen into a loose routine of who would get up during the night. Jamie always got up to do the feeds and Dani would get up to do all the times in between but she still couldn’t resist getting up for the feeds too to lend a helping hand. However, the constant disrupted sleep pattern was starting to take its toll on the both of them, especially Dani. Dani was doing way more than she needed to do, both during the night and the day. She tried to get up as often as she could in the night so that Jamie could get a good night’s sleep and she did everything that she could do during the day too. She insisted on doing Mason’s online lessons with him every day to give Jamie break from them, she did all the nappy changing that she could do, and she insisted on looking after Blake in the afternoons so Jamie could get a couple of hours of sleep.

“I’ll go” Dani whispered into Jamie’s neck as she started to untangle her limbs from where they were wrapped around Jamie. 

“It’s okay, it’s my turn” Jamie said as she placed a hand on Dani’s thigh to still her movements, “You got up last time”.

“It’s okay, I can go, you need your sleep” Dani whispered as she kissed Jamie’s neck softly, “It should only be a nappy change”.

“Dani” Jamie said seriously as she turned over to face her wife, “I’ve got it. You need your sleep too, baby. You’ve been doing way more than I have these past weeks, just rest, okay?”.

“Okay” Dani said softly as she let Jamie kiss her lips quickly before getting out of bed to tend to their daughter. 

1 minute later, Dani came into the nursery where Jamie had taken Blake to be changed with Jamie’s flannel wrapped around her to keep the cold off of her.

“Is she okay?” Dani whispered as she wrapped her arms around Jamie’s waist from behind.

“I thought I told you to go back to sleep” Jamie chuckled as Blake began to wave her arms around after seeing Dani appear above her.

“I just wanted to see if you needed any help” Dani said as she placed a sleepy kiss to Jamie’s neck before resting her chin back on Jamie’s shoulder.

“We’re all good” Jamie said as she wrestled with Blakes kicking legs to put her clean nappy on, “Just a nappy change, you were right. Now go back to bed, you’ve hardly had any sleep these last few nights”.

“I’m fine” Dani said as she reached her finger out for Blake to grab hold of.

“You’re tired, I can tell from your voice, baby” Jamie said before she turned to place a soft kiss to Dani’s cheek, “Now go back to bed, I’ll be there in a minute”.

“I’m not tired” Dani said again, trying to reiterate her point, even though it was a lie as she prised her finger from Blake’s grasp, “But I’ll go anyway”.

“Good night, baby” Jamie whispered as she turned to place another kiss to her wife’s cheek before going back to wrestling Blake’s kicking legs into her baby grow.

“Good night, my beautiful baby” Dani cooed as she bent down to place a soft kiss to Blake’s cheek. “And good night to my other beautiful baby” Dani giggled as she placed a loving kiss to Jamie’s lips before heading out of the door and back into their bedroom.

The day started like it did any other day. Blake woke up at 6am and screamed the house down until Jamie picked her up and gave her her morning feed and then everyone went back to sleep for an hour or so before the alarm went off to signal that they had to start the day.

They had tried their best to stick to a routine for their own sake as well as Mason’s. His usual routine was already distrusted by not going to school and having his baby sister wake him up at all times of the night that Dani and Jamie thought it would be best to keep him to a routine as close as possible to his usual one and that meant waking up early.

Jamie made breakfast whilst Dani helped Mason get ready for the day and by the time that they were showered and dressed, a plate of pancakes was ready and waiting for them on the kitchen table. Once breakfast was devoured, Dani and Mason stayed at the kitchen table to start his lessons for the day whilst Jamie and Blake went for a walk around the park and to check on the flower shop.

“Hey, kiddo” Jamie said cheerfully as she walked through the living room door after arriving home to find Mason sat alone at the kitchen table surrounded by art supplies, “Where’s Mommy?”.

“She went to the bathroom” Mason said as he looked up at Jamie who was stood in the middle of the living room with confusion written all over her face.

“Okay, has she just gone now?” Jamie asked as her eyebrows knitted further in confusion as Dani never left Mason on his own to do his work as he usually quickly went off topic to do something else that wasn’t related to his schoolwork and by the look of the cardboard box he was gluing, it looked like Dani had been gone a while.

“No, she went like, I dunno, 5 minutes ago” Mason said as she continued pouring a significant amount of glue onto a cereal box and sticking pipe cleaners to it.

“Okay, kiddo, erm… just hang tight there for me. Try not to get glue on the floor if you can, okay?” Jamie said as she quickly headed off upstairs with Blake in her car seat.

“Dani?” Jamie asked tentatively as she reached the top of the stairs to look around for any sign of where her wife might be. The closed bathroom door with light spilling out from underneath it gave away her location straight away.

“Dani?” Jamie asked softly as she gently knocked on the door.

Jamie heard a few sniffles then a pause before she heard Dani whisper a soft, “Yeah?”.

“Can I come in?” Jamie asked as her hand played with the handle of the door waiting for permission to enter. She knew Dani had been crying and she so desperately wanted to just open the door and wrap her up in her arms, but she knew Dani was probably crying alone in the bathroom for a reason and that she probably didn’t want Jamie to just burst thought the door without warning.

“Yeah” Dani said softly.

As soon as Jamie opened the door, the sight that she was met with broke her heart. Dani was stood awkwardly in the middle of the room with her arms wrapped around her front, her head bowed slightly with bright red eyes.

“Oh, baby” Jamie said quietly as she placed Blake in her car seat on the bathroom counter before closing the gap between her and her wife, being sure to leave a little room if Dani needed it, “Can I hug you?”.

Dani just nodded lightly then fell into Jamie’s embrace as she held her tightly.

“What’s wrong, baby?” Jamie whispered as she rubbed Dani’s back hoping it would bring her a little comfort.

“I’m just so tired” Dani whispered as tears began to escape her already red and puffy eyes again.

“Oh, baby” Jamie said softly as she held her even tighter. 

Guilt stabbed her in the gut as she heard Dani’s words and Jamie couldn’t help but blame herself. She knew Dani was doing far too much and she had told her so, but Jamie had never actually done anything to stop her and she couldn’t help but blame herself for the way her wife was feeling.

“Shhh, baby it’s okay” Jamie whispered as she rocked them side to side softly and rubbed soothing circles on Dani’s back, “It’s okay”.

“I just feel so awful. Mason asked me a question and I couldn’t even think clearly enough to answer him” Dani whispered through her cries as she buried her face into Jamie’s neck.

“It’s okay, baby” Jamie whispered as she tried her best to soothe her wife. Jamie just held her tightly for a minute then said, “Come here” as she guided Dani towards the edge of the bath and got her to sit down. She then squatted in front of her and placed her hands on her thighs. “This is what we’re going to do, okay? We’re going to create a timetable rota thingy, okay?” Jamie said as she ran her hands up and down Dani’s thighs.

“What?” Dani chuckled as she wiped the tears from her eyes so that she could get a clearer look at Jamie in front of her.

“We’re going to create a timetable. You’ve been doing way more than you should have been doing and I should have done something about it and I’m really sorry for letting you get like this, it shouldn’t have happened” Jamie said as she took hold of one of Dani’s hands.

“It’s not your fault” Dani said softly as she continued to wipe the tears falling from her eyes.

“It is and I should have done something earlier. I’m sorry” Jamie said seriously as she squeezed Dani’s hand softly.

“Like what?” Dani said chuckling as her cries started to slow.

“Chaining ya up or something, I don’t know” Jamie said laughing softly in hopes of cheering Dani up a little.

Dani just laughed as she wiped the remaining tears from her cheeks, “Sounds like fun”.

“You’re such a tease, Poppins” Jamie said, playfully pushing Dani’s leg, “You know I can't do any of that stuff yet”.

“Sorry” Dani said giggling as she reached down to hold Jamie’s other hand in hers.

“Be seriously, we’re making a timetable or something, okay? We both get equal amounts of work, okay?” Jamie said seriously as she ran her thumbs over the backs of Dani’s hands, “And we stick to it”.

“Okay, but-”.

“No buts, okay? Equal amounts of everything. We both teach Mason, we both do changing times, we both have equal amounts of breaks and we both alternate getting up in the night. And when it’s my turn to get up in the night, no getting up with me, okay?” Jamie said, smiling softly as she watched a small grin appear on Dani’s lips as she knew she couldn’t help but go and check on Jamie and Blake during the night.

“Okay” Dani giggled as she stood up and pulled Jamie up with her to give her a hug.

“And for the rest of the day, you’re doing nothing. You need a break” Jamie said as she placed a few loving kisses to Dani’s neck.

“But so do you, baby, your bodies still healing” Dani protested as she knew how important it was for Jamie to rest too. The main reason she had taken on so much in the first place was to give Jamie a chance to heal. Jamie had done the same thing after Mason was born so Dani wanted to return the favour. “We’re both no good if we’re tired all the time, are we?” Dani said as she pulled back to look into Jamie’s eyes.

“Suppose you’re right” Jamie chuckled as she rested her forehead against Dani’s, “How about we both have a break then?”.

Dani smiled widely and nodded, “Okay, what shall we do then?”.

“How about…” Jamie started as she paused for a second to think, “You go and get your PJs on and pick a book and I’ll come read to you? How does that sound? You’ve not picked up a book that wasn’t baby related for so long and I’ve not read to you in ages either so how about we do that then?”.

“That sounds good, yeah” Dani said as she nuzzled her face into Jamie’s neck and kissed the skin there a few times, “You’re the best wife in the whole world”.

“No, I think you win that award” Jamie chuckled as she pulled away from Dani’s embrace to kiss her lips, “Now, go get your PJs on whilst I go sort Mason out who’s probably glued himself to the kitchen table by now”.

“What?!” Dani said as her head shot up in panic and sheer terror.

“We need to do this more often” Dani whispered as she laid in Jamie’s arms, wrapped in the duvet whilst Jamie read her favourite book to her.

They had let Mason abandon his schoolwork for the day and left him to his own devices in his bedroom away from the supply of glue and glitter that he had managed to find when Dani had been gone. Blake was laid in her cot next to them peacefully fast asleep for the time being, but the likelihood was that she would be screaming the house down for milk in the next hour or so, so Dani and Jamie were trying to make the most of the rare silence that had fallen over their house.

“I know, I’m sorry for not realising how much you needed a break sooner” Jamie whispered back as she placed a kiss to Dani’s temple.

“It’s okay, I should have told you instead of letting it get to the point where I had to go and cry in the bathroom by myself” Dani whispered as she took hold of Jamie’s hand that was resting on her stomach.

“You can always talk to me, you know that don’t you?” Jamie whispered as she squeezed Dani’s hand.

“I know, I’m sorry I didn’t just talk to you. I honestly didn’t realise how overwhelmed I was” Dani said honestly.

“I know, baby. But I'm always here, okay? I promise I’ll do better at giving you a break and giving us time like this together” Jamie said seriously as she shuffled down further under the duvet with Dani in her arms.

“I promise too” Dani whispered as her head rested on the pillow below her.

“Now get some sleep, baby. I’ve got Blake if she wakes up, okay? You just stay here and get some well-deserved rest” Jamie whispered as she placed a loving kiss to Dani’s cheek before placing the book in her hand down on the bed beside her.

Within a minute, Dani’s shallow rhythmic breathing and soft snores filled the room and Jamie’s didn’t follow far behind.


	13. Quality Time

“Dani?!” Jamie shouted as she stood at the front door with 3 parcels in her hands that she had just collected off the postman and a frown on her face.

“One minute” Dani called from upstairs and then a few seconds later, Jamie heard her footsteps start to come down the stairs.

“You okay?” Dani asked when she was halfway down the stairs.

“What have you been buying again?” Jamie said with a small smirk on her face and a raised eyebrow.

Ever since Blake had been born, parcel after parcel after parcel had been delivered to their door all under Dani’s name and Jamie had started to get a little concerned over how much Dani was spending. Jamie wasn’t mad at her, she could never be mad at Dani, Dani could spend her money however she wanted to, but Jamie was little concerned about how many parcels were getting delivered.

“Baby clothes” Dani stated happily as she took the boxes off of Jamie and started to open them, careful not to cross contaminate them with the clean contents of the boxes. As soon as all the clothes were retrieved from the parcels, Dani washed her hands then took them over to the laundry room to put them in the washing machine. 

Jamie just laughed softly as she watched her wife happily walk away with yet another bunch of baby clothes that Blake very likely didn’t need.

An hour or so later, Jamie took them out of the tumble dryer to inspect them. Although she was a little concerned about their bank balance having taken a good hit with the amount of new clothes Dani had bought Blake over the past few weeks, Jamie couldn’t help but smile every time she picked up a new adorable baby grow. She had done the same thing when they first had Mason so she couldn’t blame Dani for doing the same. Jamie had gone a little overboard too. She would stop by the baby store that was opposite her flower shop a few times a week to pick out some cute clothes for her son in the weeks after Mason was born even though he really didn’t need any. They had saved a lot of his clothes just in case they ever had another baby so Blake wasn’t short of anything to wear but neither of them could help buying her new adorable clothes. 

Jamie laughed softly as she held up the new tiny t-shirt that Dani had bought for Blake as she read the words on the front ‘I love my Mummies’. Dani had gone down the rabbit hole of inclusive baby clothes and was shocked to find so many. She had bought Mason a handful of baby grows with ‘I love my Mums’ on when he was born but the shops hardly had any like that when he was little, so she was shocked to find such a wide selection for Blake now.

“It’s cute right?” Dani giggled as she wrapped her arms around Jamie from behind and kissed her cheek lovingly.

“Yeah, it is” Jamie chuckled as she folded it up and went to pick up another one that had a family of four on the front; two Mums, a brother and a sister. “Is this supposed to be us?” Jamie laughed as her eyes took in the image and noticed how much the characters resembled them.

“Yeah” Dani laughed softly as her grip on Jamie’s waist tightened, “I couldn’t not buy it, they all looked just like us”.

“They actually do a little” Jamie remarked as she stared at the character with short curly brown hair that was meant to resemble her, “Where did you even get all of these from?”.

“I fell down a bit of a rabbit hole” Dani said chuckling as she rested her head on Jamie’s shoulder, “Then I stumbled upon this small business a few towns over and they had such a wide selection of baby clothes with ‘I love my Mummies and I love my Daddies’ on that I couldn’t help but buy a few. I know it's cheesy, but we really struggled to find ones like that for Mason when he was born so I couldn’t help but buy a few for Blake”.

Jamie just shook her head slightly as she chuckled. “You’re so adorable, baby” Jamie said smiling softly as she turned to face her wife, “And I know we struggled so much to find clothes like that for Mason, I can't believe how much the world has changed in the past 8 years. You can buy baby grows like this in the supermarkets now, it’s crazy”.

“It really is” Dani said smiling widely, “Can you believe that we couldn’t even legally get married when Mason was born and look at us now”.

“So much has happened in such a short amount of time” Jamie remarked as she smiled lovingly at Dani whilst taking Dani’s left hand and lifting it up. “Becoming your wife was by far one of the happiest days of my life” Jamie whispered before she placed a gentle kiss on top of Dani’s wedding ring.

“Me too” Dani said smiling widely as she marvelled that the woman stood in front of her was her wife. Sometimes it hit her at random times during the day when Jamie was washing the dishes or watching TV that they were legally married. Dani had proposed before the law had changed and they already deemed themselves ‘married’ but there was something different about signing their names on their wedding certificate and legally being each other’s wives. “And what were the other happiest days of your life, baby?” Dani asked as she wrapped her arms around Jamie’s neck and swayed them softly side to side.

“Finding out you were pregnant with Mason” Jamie said smiling widely as she remembered her and Dani sat in their old tiny apartment together holding 4 positive pregnancy tests between them and crying with pure joy and astonishment. 

“That was such a great day” Dani whispered quietly as she recalled the same memory.

“Finding out that I was pregnant was a pretty great day too” Jamie said chuckling as her arms wrapped around Dani’s waist to pull her closer so that their hips were pressed together, “And the days that the kids were born, they are definitely joint second place on the list”.

Dani just hummed and nodded in agreement as she nuzzled her nose against Jamie’s before connecting their lips. They had hardly spent any alone time together since Blake had arrived so they took it where they could, even if that meant making out in the tiny laundry room for 5 minutes.

Jamie deepened the kiss as Dani pushed her back against the wall and pulled her closer by her hair.

As Dani’s tongue explored Jamie’s mouth, Jamie pulled her hips flush with Dani’s as she let out a few soft moans. They hadn't had sex in almost 5 weeks so their desire for the other was immense but Jamie was still a little sore to be doing any of that but that didn’t mean that she couldn’t help Dani relieve some of her tension.

Jamie slipped her hands under Dani’s jumper and started roaming her soft warm skin as her lips moved away from Dani’s mouth and down her jaw and to the sweet spot on her neck.

Dani let out breathy moan as Jamie’s teeth lightly grazed along her neck and her eyes fluttered shut and her head fell back to allow Jamie’s more room.

“Think we have enough time?” Jamie whispered as her fingers landed on the buttons of Dani’s jeans.

“I’ll be quick” Dani whispered as her fingernails grazed over Jamie’s hips and pulled her closer.

Jamie’s let out a soft chuckled as her fingers fiddled with the buttons on Dani’s jeans and then pulled down the zip. Just as Jamie’s hand slipped down the front of Dani’s jeans, the moment was interrupted by an all too familiar high-pitched cry coming from Blake.

“Fuck” Jamie groaned as she playfully rolled her eyes and Dani just let out a soft laugh as she pulled away from Jamie’s lips.

“Kind of regret saying how much I loved the day she was born” Jamie chuckled playfully as she placed a quick kiss to Dani’s cheek before heading off to tend to Blake.

“You don’t mean that” Dani giggled as she followed behind Jamie fastening up her jeans as she went.

“Course I don’t” Jamie laughed as she picked up Blake and rocked her gently in hopes of trying to soothe her cries. “You’re my favourite girl in the whole wide world, aren’t you sweetheart?” Jamie cooed as she placed a few soft kisses to Blake’s cheeks.

“What about me?” Dani asked in mock shock as she stood next to Jamie and began helping to soothe Blake by stroking her cheek lightly.

“Erm…” Jamie chuckled softly as she pretended to be stumped by the question, “You’re my favourite wife”.

“I’m your only wife!” Dani exclaimed as she playfully nudged Jamie’s arm and then placed her free hand around Jamie’s waist.

“Hence, why I've only married you. You’re my favourite wife so I didn’t need another one” Jamie joked as she continued to rock Blake who was beginning to settle down from the comfort provided to her by her Mums.

“You’re so dumb” Dani teased, “I love you so much”. 

____

“Good morning, kiddo” Jamie said cheerfully as Mason made his way down the stairs one morning and headed straight towards her. Just before Jamie could place their breakfasts on the table, Mason wrapped his arms tightly around her waist and rested his head against her stomach. “Hey, what’s wrong?” Jamie asked, her voice turning from cheerful to anxious as she placed the plates down on the table so that she could wrap her arms around her son.

“I miss you” Mason whispered softly against Jamie’s jumper as his arms tightened around her.

Jamie pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and took a seat. She then patted her knee which caused Mason to climb up into her lap and sit down. 

Jamie knew having another baby would be hard on Mason and her and Dani had talked to him about it before Blake had come along but it was different talking about it then actually experiencing it. Mason had done a great job over the past month looking after Blake and doing what he could for her, but he missed Jamie and Jamie missed him. For the past year almost, Jamie had been the one to sit with him day in and day out doing his schoolwork with him and looking after him during the day. They were already pretty close but that had only made their bond grow even stronger, so it was tough when a new little life took the majority of her attention away from him.

Jamie had tried hard to make sure that Mason felt included and she had tried hard to spend as much one on one time with him as she could but with Blake needing feeding every 2 hours or so, it had been difficult. The only time that they had really gotten to be together was when they would fall asleep together each the morning after Blake had woke up for her 6am feed. Sometimes Jamie would even go back into Mason’s room with him and fall asleep in his bed like she used to do when he was younger.

“I miss you too, kiddo” Jamie said softly as she wrapped her arms back around Mason tightly, “I’m sorry I’m always busy, I know it must be hard for you, kiddo”.

“It’s okay” Mason said softly as he lent his head on Jamie’s shoulder, “I know Blake needs you”.

Jamie just smiled softly as she held Mason tightly. She marvelled in just how much of an amazing young boy he had turned out to be. He was laid in exactly the same position that he used to when he was just a baby and Jamie remembered how nervous she was at the time to be his mother. The whole changing him, dressing his and feeding him was easy, it was the raising him part that she was apprehensive about. Her parents hadn't been great role models, so she wasn’t exactly sure where to start with raising a child but from the extremely kind, caring and compassionate young boy that was sat in her lap now, she knew her and Dani had done a good job.

“You need me too though, sweetheart” Jamie said softly as she rubbed Mason back just like she used to when he was little, “And you can come to me anytime, okay? No matter what I’m doing, even if I have Blake. If you need me, you can always come to me”.

Mason just nodded softly against Jamie’s shoulder but kept his face buried in her neck.

“What about if we spend the day together, just you and me, huh? What do you say?” Jamie asked as she moved a little so that she could see her son’s face.

“Won't Blake need you?” Mason asked, a little worried for what his time with Jamie would mean for his sister.

“Mommy can look after her, she’ll be all right” Jamie said, giving Mason a reassuring smiled as he looked up at her a little worried.

“Really?” Mason asked.

“Really” Jamie said smiling widely, “What shall we do? Do you want to go to the park and play football?”.

A wide toothy grin, exactly matching the one that Dani makes, spread across Mason’s face as he and Jamie hadn't played football in well over 3 months. Although Jamie had tried to keep playing the game with him, the fact that she could no longer run properly or see the ball at her feet made her reluctantly have to stop playing with him and just sit on the side lines and watch him.

“Yeah” Mason said as he flung his arms around Jamie’s neck and hugged her tightly.

“No promises that I’ll be any good but at least I’ll be able to see the ball now” Jamie joked as she peppered Mason’s face with soft light kisses which caused him to giggle and squirm in her lap.

Just after she had fed Blake and helped her settle, Jamie and Mason walked hand in hand out of the front door as they waved goodbye to Dani and Blake and headed towards the park. Although Jamie had never really had much time away from Blake before she didn’t feel exactly like she thought she would feel. Her heart ached to be with Blake again, but it was drowned out as soon as Mason looked up at her with a wide grin on his face. She knew he needed this time as much as she did, and she knew that Blake was happy and safe with Dani, so she didn’t need to worry.

“I’m so happy” Mason said as he and Jamie swung their arms together as they walked hand in hand around the park looking at the different plants and the wildlife around them. 

She knew Dani had taken Mason to the park on many occasions since Blake had been born but she guessed that for him it just wasn’t the same as being with her. Dani didn’t exactly know a lot about plants or wildlife, although she had learnt many things from Jamie and Mason, so Jamie just guessed that Mason wanted to be with her whenever they were looking around the park for that reason. Dani had tried so hard to keep up with Masons knowledge of plants and she had bought books and paid attention to what Jamie had told her, but Dani knew that she wasn’t Jamie when it came to nature. Her and Mason had their own little interests together that Jamie didn’t really know much about so she had stopped trying to be Jamie when it came to nature.

“I’m so happy too” Jamie said as she smiled widely down at Mason who was beaming up at her with admiration in his eyes, “Wanna go play football now, then?”.

Mason just nodded enthusiastically as he picked up the pace and dragged Jamie with him.

2 hours later Mason came running through the front door with an extremely tired and sweaty Jamie trailing behind him. 

Dani just laughed softly as Mason ran up to her and threw his arms around her, eager to tell her what he and Jamie had been up to while they had been gone.

“Did you enjoy yourselves?” Dani asked as she picked Mason up and slung him over hip. He was getting a little heavy to pick up now, but Dani always tried her best to do so whenever she could as he enjoyed it so much.

“The best day ever!” Mason said enthusiastically to which Dani just laughed softly and placed a kiss to his cheek.

“I’m not in the shape I used to be” Jamie chuckled as she wiped the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand, “But, yeah, I really enjoyed it”.

“Good” Dani replied, smiling widely as she placed a kiss onto Jamie’s lips, “Blake should be good for a while so you can go and have a shower if you want”.

“How was she?” Jamie asked as she watched Dani put Mason back on the ground before he ran upstairs to change out of his dirty clothes.

“A little ray of sunshine” Dani said sarcastically as she laughed softly.

“That bad?” Jamie asked as she began to feel guilty for leaving her daughter for so long.

“She cried a little after you left and once halfway through, but she settled again so it’s fine, no need to worry” Dani said as she tried to reassure her wife, “She probably just wondered where you had gone is all”.

Jamie just wrapped her arms around Dani’s neck and hugged her tightly as a few tears fell from her eyes.

“Hey” Dani whispered as she felt Jamie’s body shake a little against her, “There’s no need to cry, baby, she was fine”.

“I know but I just feel so bad for leaving her, I missed her so much” Jamie whispered as she wiped the few tears that had fallen from her eyes.

“I know, baby, but you enjoyed going to the park, right?” Dani asked as she rubbed Jamie’s back soothingly.

“Yeah, I did” Jamie replied softly.

“And you made Mason’s day so there’s no need to feel guilty for leaving her. You had to do it someday” Dani said softly as she held Jamie tighter. She had felt the exact same way when she had first left Mason, but she knew that he was safe with Jamie so that made the situation less scary and she hoped that Jamie had felt the same way today.

“I know” Jamie whispered against Dani’s neck, “I’m so glad she had you though”.

Just as Dani was about to respond, Blake’s high-pitched cries filled the house and both women pulled away from each other.

“I’ll go” Jamie chuckled as she placed a loving kiss to Dani cheek and happily jogged off in the direction of cries.

For the rest of the day, Jamie spent as much time as she could with Mason. Every few hours or so when Blake needed feeding, Jamie would tend to her and burp her then hand her back to Dani who would shoo her away before she could change her nappy or wash her clothes or do anything to help her.

Jamie and Mason put up a tent in the back garden and built a little fire so that they could roast some marshmallows together whilst they drank the hot chocolate that Dani had made them to keep them warm in the cool air outside. Mason loved the outdoors just as much as Jamie did and they would always spend as much time outside as possible. 

Dani stood at the kitchen window with Blake and watched them as Jamie taught Mason how to light a fire safely. She loved watching them both interact with each other and do what they loved the most together. As Dani stood and watched them, she recalled the first ever camping trip that they had taken when Mason was 4 years old. Dani hated the idea of camping and still did but the look of pure joy on both Jamie and Mason’s faces as they sat together around the fire toasting marshmallows together made up for the cold and the dirt and having a sore back from sleeping in a sleeping bag.

Once the sun had started to set and the air had turned even colder, Jamie and Mason packed up and came back inside. They all then bundled up on the sofa, covered in an array of blankets whilst they watched The Lion King for what had to be the thousandth time.

“This was the best day ever” Mason whispered against Jamie’s chest just before he let the sleep which he had been holding back from wash over him. Dani was laid on the sofa with Jamie in between her legs with Mason laid on top of her.

“It was” Jamie chuckled softly as she took hold of Dani’s hand and wrapped their arms around Mason tightly as he drifted off to sleep.

“I love you” Dani whispered into Jamie’s ear as she combed through Mason’s hair with her free hand. 

“I love you too” Jamie whispered as she turned around and placed a loving kiss to Dani’s jaw.


	14. Back to School

Back to school was the 8th of March and there was only one person in the Clayton household that was looking froward to that day and it was Mason. Dani and Jamie had initially been excited about him returning to school last September but having spent almost a year at home with Mason, they had gotten quite attached to having him with them every day. Although Jamie wasn’t a huge fan of home learning, she did love how much time she had gotten to spend with her son and Dani felt the same way. After she had taken over some of the home learning responsibilities after Blake had been born, there was nothing she loved more than sitting down with Mason every day at the kitchen table and teaching him and not being able to do it anymore made her feel a little deflated. 

Jamie and Dani both knew that Mason needed to go back to school but that didn’t make the upcoming event any less emotional for them. Mason was the kind of child who thrived off having a routine and the lack of his usual one had been hard on him even though Dani and Jamie had tried to maintain it as much as possible, but it had gotten increasingly harder to do so ever since Blake had arrived. Being able to get Mason back into a good routine, having him see his friends again and getting a better education than they could provide him at home was going to be a relief but not getting to spend all day with him was going to be hard.

As soon as the announcement had been made, it was all systems go for them to be able to prepare Mason for going back to school. They had talked to him multiple times about what it might be like and what would be different about his school day when he went back, and Mason had seemed to take it all in his stride. They had also had to rush to the nearest supermarket to buy Mason new school shirts, trousers and shoes as he had outgrown the ones that they had bought him at the start of the school year, and they didn’t want them to have sold out before his first day back.

Although they knew that Mason’s school would be doing everything that they possibly could to keep everyone safe, Dani and Jamie were still worried about Mason’s health as well as their own. Luckily Dani was still on maternity leave and wouldn’t be returning to work until the end of the school year, so Jamie had one less person to be worried about returning to a busy crowded school environment. 

Jamie had decided that when Mason went back to school, she would also return to work. She wasn’t allowed to open her flower shop due to the country being in yet another lockdown, but she had kept on doing telephone orders and delivering them to her customers houses but just before Blake had arrived, she had stopped working all together. As much as she would have loved to stay at home with Dani and Blake, she knew that it was about time that she went back to work, at least part-time as the only money they had coming in was Dani’s maternity pay which was moderately less than her usually wage so they could do with the extra money.

Mason came bounding into their bedroom at 6:45am as soon as Blake had started to cry. He had clearly been awake for a while as he was bright-eyed and full of energy as his body collided with Dani’s when he jumped on top of her and he looked like had just been waiting until Blake woke everyone up before he made his lively entrance.

“Someone’s excited this morning” Jamie commented with a chuckled as she watched Dani groan as Mason’s body landed on top of hers then crawl underneath the duvet where Jamie had been laid.

Dani just hummed in response and she flung her arm over Mason’s wriggling body to pull him in close so that she didn’t get cold in Jamie’s absence as she got up to give Blake her morning feed.

“Are you excited to go to school today?” Dani asked in her groggy morning voice as she buried her face into Mason’s wild hair and inhaled his all too familiar scent that she couldn’t seem to ever get enough of. 

“Yes!” Mason shouted excitedly which caused Dani to wince a little as the noise was far louder than she would have liked for almost 7am in the morning, “I can't wait to see Billy and Hannah again. I haven’t seen them in soooo long”.

Both Dani and Jamie chuckled at his excitement as Jamie came back and sat beside the pair on the bed whilst she fed Blake whose cries had quickly gone away as soon as Jamie had started to feed her.

“Bet they’re excited to see you too, kiddo” Jamie said as Mason tried to sit up to look at his sister, but Dani had pulled him back down into a tight hug.

“Mommy!” Mason giggled as Dani’s arm pulled him back into her body as she continued to snuggle him even though he was trying to get away.

“One more minute” Dani groaned as she kissed his cheek and buried her face back into his hair again, “Before you go and leave me for the day”.

Mason just laughed softly before he gave into Dani’s request and let her hug him a little while longer.

“Will Blake be able to take me to school today?” Mason asked as he looked up at Jamie who was sat beside him.

“Erm…” Jamie said, trying to phrase her answer in a way that would be appropriate for Mason and not worry him. 

Dani and Jamie had been very reluctant to take Blake anywhere where lots of people would be as they didn’t want to chance her or any of them getting ill. Since she had been born during the third lockdown in England, there wasn’t really anywhere where they could take her anyway, but they had refrained from taking her anywhere that was busy. Blake had only ever been to the local park, Jamie’s flower shop and to the outside of Owen and Hannah’s house to wave at them through the window and they really didn’t want her to take Mason to school, not with how many people would be around for pick up and drop off.

“I think she might be a little young yet” Jamie said softly, not wanting to upset Mason as she knew that he would have loved to introduce his friends to his new sister or just have the extra moral support on his big day, “But she can wave you off at the window”.

“Oh, okay” Mason said as he thought about what Jamie had said, “I just wanted her to meet my friends, but she can do that when she’s older, can't she?”.

“Of course she can” Jamie said smiling softly, “How about you take your friends a picture of her, huh? Then you can show her to whoever you want”.

Mason’s face lit up at the idea before he said, “Yeah, I’d like that. Then I can show her to my teacher too”.

“Yeah, you can, can't you? I bet she’d love to see a picture of her” Jamie said chuckling softly. Mason’s teacher was one of Dani’s best friends so had likely seen millions of pictures of Blake since she had been born but she wasn’t going to burst Mason’s bubble by telling him that. Miss Shaw could handle seeing one more picture of Blake, especially if a very enthusiastic Mikey gave it to her.

The morning continued as normal. Dani got Mason washed and dressed whilst Jamie made everyone breakfast and before they knew it, Jamie was heading out of the front door with a very smart looking Mason beside her.

“Have a good day, sweetheart” Dani said as she bent down to give him a tight hug.

“I will” Mason said smiling widely as Dani’s arms gave him a bone-crunching hug before kissing his cheek a few times.

“See you tonight then” Dani said softly as she begged her voice not to give away how she was really feeling.

Jamie sensed her upset and flashed her a comforting smile and a playful wink which caused Dani to giggle a little before she headed to the living room window with Blake in her arms as she picked up her little fist to wave goodbye to Mason who was excitedly waving back to her.

Jamie joined the long socially distanced queue of parents outside the school gates and waited hand in hand with Mason before it was her turn to wave him goodbye.

“Enjoy your day, kiddo” Jamie said as she gave Mason a tight hug before kissing his cheek and letting him go. 

“I will” Mason said cheerfully as he beamed up at her.

It was harder than she had thought to watch him let go of her hand and walk through the school gates and into his classroom as his friends waited at the door for him. She watched from a distance as he excitedly pulled the photo of Blake that she had given him that morning out of his school bag to show his friend Billy. She was especially proud when he didn’t let Billy touch the photo and made him stand back and just look at it from a distance. Mason turned around and waved goodbye to her and Jamie did the same before walking away with a few tears trickling down her cheeks.

Just as Jamie walked through the door of her flower shop, her phone started to ring. She pulled it out of her pocket and smiled at the picture of Dani on the screen as her name appeared at the top.

“Well, hello” Jamie said with a chuckle as she answered the phone, “And to what do I owe this pleasure?”.

“Hey” Dani said giggling softly down the line, “Just wanted to ask how Mason got on”.

“He was fine” Jamie said reassuringly, “Well, more than fine actually. He said goodbye then ran off to show Billy the picture of Blake”.

“I’m glad he’s happy” Dani said as she laughed softly, “At least that makes one of us”.

“Yeah, I know, but he’ll be fine” Jamie said softly in hopes of reassuring her wife even though she was worried about him herself.

“I know” Dani whispered, “I know. It’s just hard since he’s been at home for so long where we know he’s safe”.

“Yeah, I know, but he’ll be fine” Jamie whispered back, trying to reassure herself as well as Dani.

A few moments of silence passed between them before Dani whispered softly, “I miss you”.

“I miss you too” Jamie whispered back.

“You’ve only been out of my sight for like half an hour and I already miss you” Dani giggle.

“Are we becoming too co-dependent?” Jamie chuckled as she took a seat behind her counter.

“There’s no such thing as too co-dependent” Dani whispered back with a soft laugh.

“Maybe, or maybe there is” Jamie chuckled softly, “How’s Blake? Not too co-dependent on me yet?”.

“No, not yet anyway, I’ve just read to her, mainly to stop my mind from wondering and now she’s having a nap” Dani said as she glanced over at Blake peacefully fast asleep beside her, “And now I don’t know what to do”.

“Relax” Jamie chuckled.

“You know that doesn’t come easy to me” Dani sighed.

“I know” Jamie laughed softly, “But at least try, for me. Put ya feet up, read a book, have a bath, have a nap. And if I come home and find that any of that washing has been done or the kitchen has been cleaned, then there will be serious consequences, Dani Clayton”.

“Oh really?” Dani whispered in a low husky voice, “I might just chance it then to find out what these so-called serious consequences are”. 

“Poppins,” Jamie chuckled as she felt a wave of heat travel through her body and settle in the bottom of her stomach, “You might regret saying that”.

“Oh, I’m pretty sure I won't” Dani whispered as her teeth unconsciously bit down on her bottom lip.

“Well, we’ll find out soon enough, won't we?” Jamie whispered back.

“We sure will” Dani replied quietly.

After a few seconds of silence passed as both women’s mind wondered to thoughts of the other before Dani asked, “Shall we come by the shop and give you a hand? I’ve not been in so long and I miss helping you out there?”.

“What happened to relaxing?” Jamie asked, even though she loved the idea of Dani coming to lend her a hand. They had spent many happy hours working side by side together in Jamie’s flower shop over the years when Jamie had needed the extra pair of hands.

“Well, I can relax for a little while then I could take Blake for a nice walk in the park before stopping by the shop. If I don’t keep busy, I think I’ll cry” Dani said honestly. She needed to occupy herself so that she didn’t worry about Mason all day, even though she knew that he would be fine at school, but that didn’t stop her mind from coming up with thousands of negative scenarios.

“I’d love the help” Jamie said, smiling softly at her wife’s comment. She knew that today was tough on her, but she hadn't quite anticipated how tough. “Could use your excellent flower arranging skills, I’m a little rusty” Jamie said chuckling. It was a small white lie, she wasn’t rusty at all but she could sense that Dani needed something productive to do with her day.

“I’ll be there around 11 is that okay?” Dani asked as a wide smile spread across her lips at the thought of getting to spend some time with Jamie in her beloved flower shop.

“Perfect” Jamie said as a wide grin appeared on her face, “Can't wait”.

“Me too” Dani whispered.

“Now get some rest, baby, I’ll see you soon” Jamie said smiling softly.

“See you soon, baby” Dani said quietly.

A few seconds of silence passed as each of them smiled into their phones before ending the call.

Dani rounded the corner to Jamie’s flower shop a little after 11am and hung back a little as she watched Jamie through the window unpacking a box. Jamie hadn't seen her yet, so Dani took the opportunity to just admire her wife for a minute or so. She couldn’t believe just how lucky she had been to stumble into Jamie’s life that day when she had started her new au pair job at the local manor. She was young and fresh out of college and also a bad relationship when she watched Jamie walk through the door of the kitchen for the first time. There had been no need for an introduction between the pair, just a knowing look of although I haven’t met you yet in this life, we’ve already spent so many previous lives together that I don’t need to introduce myself.

Dani smiled widely as Jamie looked up and caught her eye before she made her way into the shop.

“Look who it is, Blakie!” Dani said enthusiastically to Blake as she pushed her pram inside the shop, “It’s Mummy!”.

Jamie quickly ran into the back office to wash her hands before making her way over to her wife and their daughter.

“Oh, Blake,” Jamie cooed in her adorable baby voice that just made Dani’s heart swell with love, “I’ve missed you so much, baby”.

“She’s missed you too” Dani said softly as she watched Jamie pick their daughter up and kiss her cheek.

“And I’ve miss you too” Jamie said smiling widely at Dani before she placed a loving kiss on her lips. 

“Me too” Dani said softly before she pushed Blake’s pram to one side so that it wouldn’t get in their way.

“How has she been?” Jamie asked as she placed light kisses to the top of Blake’s head.

“Perfect” Dani replied as she smiled softly at her wife, “No crying, no fussing, just napping, playing and cuddling”.

Jamie smiled widely at Dani’s comment as she had been a little worried that Blake wouldn’t settle without her, even though she knew that Dani could soothe her if she couldn’t. “Aww, you’re such a good girl, aren’t you?” Jamie cooed as Blake reached out for Jamie’s face.

“What do you want me to do?” Dani asked as she looked around the shop which was a lot emptier than it used to be since it had been closed for over a month.

“I just need to unpack the order I got this morning and then after that just making a few orders and delivering them. You can make Mrs Smith’s order if you want, she always loves when you do them for her” Jamie said as she placed Blake back in her pram and covered her up with a blanket.

“Have you told her about Blake?” Dani asked as she turned to walk over to the stack of boxes in the corner of the shop that needed unpacking.

“Yeah, I rang her last week to tell her that I was opening back up a few days a week and she asked how we all were” Jamie said as she walked over to Dani and started to help her with the unpacking.

“Are you delivering her order today? I’d love to go and see her and show her Blake” Dani asked.

“Yeah, she’d love that too I think” Jamie replied with a soft smile as she started to sort out her delivery.

A few hours later, Dani, Jamie and Blake walked from house to house dropping off customer’s orders. Jamie was extremely thankful for their continued custom given the circumstances and would often drop off a few essential items with their orders too. Since the beginning of the pandemic weddings had been postponed and celebrations had been called off, so a large proportion of her usual custom had been lost but her usual customers still ordered bouquets and arrangements from her and Jamie had taken advantage of the booming plant business that had occurred during the pandemic too, so her shop was still making some money.

Jamie placed the final arrangement on Mrs Smith’s doorstep along with a bag of essential items and some cookies that Mason had baked. Mrs Smith was by far her most loyal customer and hadn't gone anywhere else for her flowers since Jamie had opened up her shop. Twice a week Mrs Smith would order two arrangements, one for her living room and one for her kitchen and had continued to do so through lockdown too. 

Jamie wasn’t sure if the majority of her customers still called to order her flowers or just to give them someone to talk to. A large proportion of her regular customers were elderly so every time they rung up to order flowers from her, Jamie would sit and talk to them for 20 minutes or so and then when she delivered their orders, she would always leave a bag full of shopping with them too and stand and talk to them for 10 minutes to check that they were doing okay. She knew that it had to be a lonely time for a lot of her customers so if her flowers and her light-hearted conversation could make them feel a little less lonely, she was glad.

“Oh, Jamie!” Mrs Smith said as she opened the door to see Jamie stood about 3 meters away from her doorstep.

“Good afternoon” Jamie said cheerfully.

“It is nice to see you. How are you doing, dear?” Mrs Smith asked as she put her glasses on her face that were dangling on a chain around her neck so that she could see Jamie a little better, “How’s Dani doing, I haven’t seen her for ages, and Blake and Mason, how are they doing too?”.

“We’re all good. I’ve actually got a little surprise for you” Jamie said with a little smirk on her face.

“Oh, really?” Mrs Smith asked as she furrowed her brow a little in confusion.

Dani then made her way into Mrs Smith’s view with Blake in her arms.

“Oh, Dani!” Mrs Smith exclaimed with a bright smile on her face and she squinted her eyes a little to try and see Blake better, “She’s beautiful”.

“I know” Dani giggled as she held Blake’s fist up to give Mrs Smith a wave, “How are you doing?”.

“Oh, I’m good, especially after seeing you all” Mrs Smith said before she shouted for her husband to come and look at the new baby.

Dani and Jamie just smiled widely at each other as they watched how excited Mrs Smith was to see them and they were glad that they could help brighten up her day.

“Oh, I do miss having you all round for Sunday lunch” Mrs Smith said reflectively, “And how’s Mason doing, has he gone back to school today?”.

“Yeah, he has” Jamie said, “He was very excited to go back and see his friends”.

“I bet he’s had the time of his life today then” Mrs Smith said smiling widely as she continued to squint at Blake.

“I bet he has. We’ll find out in an hour or so” Dani said smiling softly at the thought of having Mason back in her arms again, “Oh, and there’s also a photo of Mason and Blake in that bag too if you want to see Blake up close. I know it’s a little hard to get a good look from so far away”.

“Oh, I can't wait to have a good look at her but from what I can see, she’s adorable” Mrs Smith said excitedly before her husband came to the door to say hello.

Dani and Jamie stayed for a while longer before they said goodbye and headed off home as they didn’t want Blake to get too cold in the cool March air.

“I’d like to do that more often” Dani said as her and Jamie walked back home hand in hand as Dani pushed Blake in her pram, “Do deliveries and talk to people, it’s fun”.

“You can be my delivery person if you want?” Jamie chuckled.

“I’d actually love that” Dani said giggling, “I can't spend the rest of my maternity leave sat at home. Plus, it’s nice to brighten up someone’s day, isn’t it?”.

“Yeah, it is” Jamie said softly as she squeezed Dani’s hand, “That’s been my favourite part of doing deliveries, just seeing people smile when you stop by and have a chat with them for a few minutes”.

“I can see why” Dani said softly, “Does that mean you’ve hired me then to be your delivery person?”.

“Don’t see why not, Poppins” Jamie said chuckling before she placed a loving kiss to her wife’s lips.

“How much will you pay me?” Dani asked with a playful chuckle.

“Erm…” Jamie said as she furrowed her brow in thought, “Money is a little tight right now, but I can pay you in kisses?”

“And cuddles?” Dani asked with a small smile tugging at the corners of her lips.

“And cuddles” Jamie clarified with a chuckle.

“That’s fine by me” Dani said happily as she placed a loving kiss to Jamie’s cheek.

“You’re hired then” Jamie stated as she squeezed Dani’s hand in hers.


	15. Mother's Day

Mother’s Day was a big day in the Clayton household ever since Dani had gotten pregnant with Mason and each year after that, the day had been a chance to not only celebrate their family together, but it was also an extra chance for Dani and Jamie to celebrate each other too.

Their first Mother’s Day had been a quiet one. Jamie had made a special flower arrangement at her shop for Dani and had surprised her with it when she had woken up that morning. Throughout Dani’s pregnancy, Jamie had waited on her hand and foot and their first Mother’s Day as expectant parents was no different. Jamie had made Dani breakfast in bed, sat with her on the sofa and watched painfully poor rom coms and then spent the rest of the day showing her how much she loved her. 

Dani had also tried to make the day special for Jamie too, even though Jamie had been insistent on making the day about her. Dani had always been a little concerned about not wanting Jamie to feel left out during her pregnancy so no matter what she did, she made sure that Jamie was with her. Jamie loved playing an active part in Dani’s pregnancy and adored going to each and every appointment, scan and doctors’ visits but the one thing that she hated was the Mummy groups Dani took her to, but she went anyway because Dani enjoyed going and she wasn’t going to be that kind of person who just didn’t show up for their partner when they wanted them there with them. 

It was from another expectant Mum that Dani had gotten the inspiration for Jamie’s first Mother’s Day gift. The woman who she sat next to each week had said that she had given her husband a scan picture to carry around in his wallet so that he could always be close to their baby and even though her husband had been very sceptical at the time about the idea, Dani had loved it and so she had set her plan in motion for Jamie’s Mother’s Day gift. Jamie had already got a scan picture in her flower shop and she had also put one on their fridge door at home, but Dani wanted her to have one on her at all times in hopes that she could feel closer to their baby no matter where she was so, she had bought her a small silver locket necklace with their most recent scan picture in and Jamie had loved it. Over the years, the pictures had changed from scan pictures to baby pictures and now to the most recent school picture of Mason and one of the first photos they had taken of Blake, but every day without fail, the necklace would be around Jamie’s neck, resting on her heart and she had worn it for almost 8 years now. 

Every Mother’s Day since the first one that they had celebrated together, they had cherished, especially as Mason had gotten older and was more able to understand the significance of the day. Now, their first Mother’s Day with Blake having joined their family was going to be another special one to remember. 

Jamie had woken Mason up just after 6:30am that Mother’s Day so that they would be able to prepare for the day. Jamie’s plan was to let Dani sleep in that morning as she hadn't been having a lot of sleep for the past week as she was worrying about Mason going back to school so she had been tending to Blake a lot more during the night. As much as Jamie had tried to get Dani to sleep in for longer in the mornings, she had always insisted on getting up at the same time as her and Mason. To allow Dani to sleep in a little longer than usual, Jamie had to sneak Blake out of her cot in their bedroom and downstairs without her waking up and consequently waking Dani up too and much to her surprise, she had managed to do it successfully. 

After Blake had had her morning feed and nappy change and Jamie and Mason had had a piece of fruit each to keep their hunger at bay until they made breakfast for them all whilst watching a few cartoons on TV, Jamie had set about helping Mason prepare Dani’s favourite pancakes. Jamie was by far the worst cook in the family and with the amount of time that Mason had spent in the kitchen helping Dani, his cooking skills had far surpassed Jamie’s, so she had put Mason in charge of making the day’s breakfast. She retrieved all the ingredients that Mason had told her that he needed and then she just stood back and supervised. 

Whilst Mason was still working on combining the dry ingredients to form a batter, Jamie set about retrieving the arrangement that she had made for Dani the day before and putting in on the kitchen table along with the small selection of gifts that were from her, Mason and Blake.

“Mum!” Mason complained as Jamie lent over him to place the flowers on the kitchen table where he was working on his batter, “You’re getting in the way”.

Jamie just chuckled as she purposefully pushed into his side a little more, “I think you’ll find that you’re the one who’s actually in the way”.

“No, I’m not!” Mason said laughing as he pushed against Jamie’s hip to move her out of his way.

“Yes, you are” Jamie said, trying hard not to laugh as she pushed back against Mason’s actions.

“No, I’m not! I was here first!” Mason said laughing even louder as he abandoned his mixing bowl and spoon to place both hands on Jamie’s hip to push her away.

“Yes. You. Are” Jamie said as she grabbed Mason and flung him over her shoulder with ease. 

Jamie’s action caused Mason to laugh loudly and wriggle around in her tight grip and as his legs were swinging in the air, his foot accidentally knocked over an open bag of flour that Jamie had put on the highest shelf to keep it from getting knocked over. The flour landed on the work surface and split open, causing the flour to spill all over Jamie’s side as well as the floor.

The pair both froze as they watched the flour fall in slow motion before covering one side of Jamie’s body.

“Oh… my” Jamie said as she looked down at her side and at the large pile of flour on the floor beside her.

“I’m sorry” Mason whispered nervously, hoping that he wouldn’t get into too much trouble for the mess that he had just unintentionally caused.

Jamie slowly lowered Mason down and placed him on the floor away from the pile of flour and slowly stood up and dusted herself off before reaching for a handful of flour and whispering playfully, “Oh, you will be”.

With that, Jamie sprinkled the handful of flour that she had over Mason’s head before he could fully process what was happening. He then stood in shock for a second with wide eyes staring back at Jamie in disbelief before he reached down to the pile of flour on the floor to retaliate.

For the next few minute or so, Jamie and Mason ran around the kitchen throwing flour at each other and laughing loudly as they tried their best not to be too loud so that they didn’t wake Dani up.

-

Dani had woken up and naturally reached out in front of her to try and find her wife but that morning, she had no luck. Dani slowly opened her eyes once her hand had explored the cold patch of bedsheets where Jamie would usually be laid, and her eyes fell on the clock on Jamie’s bedside table which read 8:04am. Dani furrowed her brow in confusion as she hadn't woken up after 6:30am for quite a while now and the absence of her wife made more sense if the clock in front of her was telling the truth. Dani then got out of bed and trailed into the bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her face before she threw on one of Jamie’s flannels that she often slept in to go and find her family.

When Dani made it halfway down the stairs, she heard Jamie and Mason laughing loudly and letting out soft high-pitched screams.

“And what’s going on in here then?” Dani asked with a soft giggle as Jamie and Mason froze and turned to look at her with handfuls of flour that they were getting ready to throw at each other.

A small smirk appeared on Dani’s lips as her eyes scanned the kitchen to find abandoned baking and flour covering all of the work surfaces, the kitchen table and all of the floor.

“Nothing” Jamie said as she slowly stood up from where she was partially hidden behind the kitchen table that she had been using to shield from Mason’s flour attack, “We were just making you breakfast”.

“Really?” Dani giggled as she watched Mason copy his Mums actions and stood up from where he was hiding on the opposite side of the kitchen table as he discretely dropped the handful of flour onto the floor beside him.

“Pancakes” Mason said as he flashed his Mom a wide, innocent smile like he hadn't done a single thing wrong in all of his life.

“Pancakes, huh?” Dani said as she walked over to Mason, “What’s the special occasion?”.

“Mother’s Day” Mason said happily as Dani picked him up and kissed his cheek.

“It is, isn’t it?” Dani said smiling widely as she walked her and Mason over to Jamie who was trying to kick the pile of flour on the floor underneath the kitchen table. “Happy Mother’s Day, baby” Dani said softly as she placed a loving kiss to Jamie’s lips.

“Happy Mother’s Day too, baby” Jamie whispered as Dani pulled away from her.

“And stop kicking the flour underneath the table, baby” Dani giggled as she walked away from her wife to go and find Blake.

“I-I, I wasn’t” Jamie said as she reached over to find the brush so that she could sweep up her and Mason’s mess.

Whilst Jamie did the cleaning up of her and Mason’s mess, Mason carried on making his batter as Dani sat and played with Blake in the living room and once the pancake mix was ready, Jamie stood next to Mason intently watching him so that he didn’t hurt himself as he cooked their breakfast with skilled ease.

“These look amazing, baby” Dani said excitedly to Mason as she sat down at the kitchen table with Blake in her arms.

“They do” Jamie said as both she and Mason sat down on either side of Dani, “You really have a talent for making pancakes, don’t you?”.

“Yeah” Mason said with a wide smile on his face as he rightfully took all of the credit for their delicious looking breakfast. “Oh” Mason said as if he had suddenly remembered why there was a pile of presents and a large bouquet of flowers on the table in front of Dani, “These are for you”.

Dani smiled widely as Mason grinned back at her with chocolate already around his mouth even though he had only taken one bite of his pancakes.

“The flowers are from me, obviously” Jamie said as she took a bit of her food, “And the presents are from the kids”.

Dani smiled widely at Jamie using the word ‘kids’. It still felt a little surreal that they had two of them and it made her heart flutter a little as she heard the phrase being used. “Thank you” Dani said softly as she leant forward to place a quick kiss to Jamie’s lips, “I don’t know how you always manage to outdo yourself every year”.

“What can I say?” Jamie said as a playful, cocky smile appeared on her lips, “It’s a talent”.

“It is” Dani said giggling a little as she rolled her eyes playful at her wife. “And thank you for the presents, sweetheart” Dani said as she turned her attention to Mason who had a mouthful of pancakes, “And thank you too, Blakie. I can't wait to open them”.

“What about Mummy’s presents?” Mason mumbled as his mouth was full of pancakes.

“We can open them all together after breakfast if you want?” Dani suggested as she gave Mason a not so sly wink.

Just short of an hour later, after they had finished off their breakfast and gotten ready for the day, they all gathered in the living room so that they could open their Mother’s Day gifts. Dani had gone first, opening the obligatory ‘World’s best Mum’ cup which Jamie also got one of too. Although those products were a little cheesy, they both adored them as they still weren’t over the novelty of being parents and they both always felt so proud when they would use them and be reminded of what an incredible family that they had made together.

Once Dani had opened all of her presents, Jamie was next.

“Mason insisted on choosing them for you so you might be a little surprised when you open them” Dani said giggling knowingly at what Jamie was about to find.

Jamie just chuckled as she shook her head softly, “He really wanted to buy you a massive dinosaur stuffed toy, but I managed to persuade him that you would probably prefer the tiny dinosaur earrings instead”.

“They are so cute” Dani said as she reached up to touch the earrings that Mason had chosen for her, “I love them. They were definitely the right choice”.

“Yeah, I have no idea what we would have even done with a massive dinosaur stuffed toy” Jamie chuckled as she picked up one of her presents “Now let’s see what you let him buy for me then”.

Jamie smiled widely as she opened the small rectangular box that contained a small silver necklace with a tiny silver dinosaur pendant on. Mason had always loved dinosaurs ever since he was little and both Dani and Jamie thought that he would have moved onto a different obsession as he had gotten older, but he had stuck with dinosaurs and if they were being honest, that had also fallen a little in love with them too. Their house was filled with dinosaur toys, books and blankets so it was a good job that they both loved them too.

Jamie then furrowed her eyebrows in confusion as she opened an envelope that contained a small card which read ‘Look in the shed’ in Mason’s handwriting. 

All four of them then made their way out of the house and up the garden to the shed. The shed was mainly used by Jamie as no one else except Mason ever needed anything out of it and that was where Jamie usually hid Dani’s gifts, so she was a little confused as to why her gift was hidden in there. However, it all became a lot clearer as Jamie opened the shed door and her eyes fell upon the large dinosaur stuffed toy that she had persuaded Mason that Dani didn’t need.

“Dani” Jamie chuckled softly as she turned around to see Mason excitedly jumping up and down beside her.

“Do you like it?” Mason asked, hoping that his Mum would say yes.

“Course I do, kiddo” Jamie chuckled as she picked Mason up and kissed him on the cheek, “But I reckon that you had some ulterior motives for buying me this, didn’t you?”.

“He insisted that it would make a great snuggle toy for when we’re watching movies and I have to agree with him” Dani said giggling softly as she saw the slight annoyance in her wife’s eyes as she looked over at the giant stuffed animal that they really didn’t need or have the room for.

“You both shouldn’t be let loose with money, but I do have to admit that I think you’re right” Jamie said laughing as she placed Mason back onto the floor and went to pick up the toy. “How about we test its ability to be a great snuggle toy then and spend all day cuddling and watching films, huh?” Jamie suggested in an exciting tone as she slung the dinosaur over her shoulder with a wide smile on her face as she took hold of Mason’s hand and lead them back into the house.

Just as Jamie had promised, the rest of the day was spent on the sofa watching whatever film that they decided on first whilst they cuddled in close to each other. They usually went to the beach or visited the local farm on Mother’s Day but this year, due to the lockdown, nothing was open, and the poor weather didn’t even allow them to have a picnic in the park but none of them were mad about that as they loved nothing more than watching children’s films that they had already watched at least 5 times whilst cuddled up on the sofa together.

“Do you like your gift?” Dani giggled softly as she looked over a Mason who was fast asleep on top of the giant stuffed dinosaur which was taking up half of the sofa which meant that they were tightly tucked up on the other half.

“I do” Jamie chuckled as she looked over at Mason too and then down at Blake who was fast asleep in her arms holding onto the tip of the dinosaur’s tail, “But I think someone likes it a little more”.

“I couldn’t help it” Dani whispered as she pulled Jamie in closer to her, “He so desperately wanted it and I couldn’t say no. I hope you’re not too mad at me, I know we don’t really have the room for it”.

“I could never be mad at you” Jamie whispered with a chuckle as she turned a little in her wife’s arms to place a soft kiss to her cheek, “You’re too cute”.

“I love you” Dani whispered, “And Happy Mother’s Day again”.

“Happy Mother’s Day, too” Jamie said softly as she turned back around and rested her head on her wife’s chest, “I still can't believe we’re parents sometimes”.

“I know” Dani giggled as she watched Blake over Jamie’s shoulder wiggle around in her sleep, “But there’s no one else I would rather be a parent with”.

“Me too” Jamie whispered as she felt sleep start to take over her, just as it had done with Mason and Blake, “Me too”.


End file.
